In the title story, Faith, adopted from an orphanage in Chennai and brought to Wyoming to live, is thrilled when a bunch of young college students from India invite her to a Diwali celebration. She arrives there wearing a sari clumsily over her jeans and is disillusioned when she realises that her chicken is inedible to her vegetarian friends.

She struggles to belong but does not know Indian movie stars and cricket matches. The character was inspired by an adopted Indian girl who was found “exotic” by others at the University of Wyoming where McConigley was studying.

“When I came to write the story I thought about the word exotic. Faith, Wyoming, the exotic animals, the Indian students, cricket, food, the Diwali ceremony – and of course, the llama...I wanted to look at both sides, and see if I could write a story about how hard it is to fit in, even if you look like you belong.”

Cowboy and East Indians is as much about places as the people in it – the crowded streets of Chennai and the open landscape of Wyoming. And eventually it’s Wyoming that stays in the head. When the author was asked what she loved the most there, her reply was: “How much time do you have?” It’s only in Wyoming that you can drive out of town and be in prairie and sagebrush in minutes. Where the antelopes are as regular as pigeons in your garden.

The collection of short stories won a 2014 PEN Open Book Award. From motel owners to rig workers, from cross-dressers to exchange students, it examines the rural immigrant experience which is not often explored in diasporic literature. It echoes Vonnegut’s statement: “Out on the edge you see all kinds of things you can’t see from the center.”

Published in 2013.