Paperback review: At the Time of Partition, By Moniza Alvi The year is 1947 - the year of Partition - and a family is forced to leave their home in Ludhiana for Lahore. It begins with a bus journey, taken in an impressionistic haze of fear and brutality as men and women are butchered in the crossing. Alvi captures the trauma of a nation in this slim, exquisitely mournful story of departure, migration and the uncertain feelings of settling in a new country: "It will take time./Of course, of course.