Books I Read in May (2020)

This was a rather productive reading month for me. Managed to read quite a few books – most of which I really enjoyed. So here goes (previous part here)…

1-  The Rearranged Life by Annika Sharma

Nithya, a vivacious, intelligent and driven college senior has always known what she has wanted: a successful career in medicine and the love of her family. She’s even come to terms with the idea of an arranged marriage, a tradition her conservative Indian family has held up for thousands of years.

When a night of partying puts her on a collision course with danger, Nithya’s entire life changes.

Enter James St. Clair, the smart, challenging and heartbreakingly handsome American.

As Nithya and James fall in love, she questions the future she and her parents have always planned. Now, Nithya has a choice to make: become a doctor and a good Indian bride, or step away from her family and centuries of culture to forge her own path.

The decision she comes to takes her on a journey that transforms how she sees her future, her relationships with loved ones, and how she learns to put herself back together when even her best-laid plans fall apart.

I love reading books with protagonists of Indian origin living outside the country, as I find their struggle to manage both their identities quite relatable, being an NRI myself. This one was a light, breezy read that could have been so much better, but a quick read nevertheless. I could relate a lot with Nithya and her struggles – both personal and professional. I just wish the romance was more swoony,

2- Pride by Ibi Zoboi

Zuri Benitez has pride. Brooklyn pride, family pride, and pride in her Afro-Latino roots. But pride might not be enough to save her rapidly gentrifying neighborhood from becoming unrecognizable.

When the wealthy Darcy family moves in across the street, Zuri wants nothing to do with their two teenage sons, even as her older sister, Janae, starts to fall for the charming Ainsley. She especially can’t stand the judgmental and arrogant Darius. Yet as Zuri and Darius are forced to find common ground, their initial dislike shifts into an unexpected understanding.

But with four wild sisters pulling her in different directions, cute boy Warren vying for her attention, and college applications hovering on the horizon, Zuri fights to find her place in Bushwick’s changing landscape, or lose it all.

This contemporary retelling of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice was an enjoyable read. I loved the female protagonist (who for some reason I kept imagining as Sai Pallavi) and admired her strength and pride despite the adverse circumstances she had to live in. The romance between Zuri and Darius too had a lot of chemistry, but the way Darius confesses his feelings to Zuri seemed to rushed for me to soak it in. Nevertheless, liked the way the author handled pressing issues like class divide, cultural conflict and so on in a poignant yet engaging manner.

3- Love, Hate and Other Filters by Samira Ahmed

American-born seventeen-year-old Maya Aziz is torn between worlds. There’s the proper one her parents expect for their good Indian daughter: attending a college close to their suburban Chicago home, and being paired off with an older Muslim boy her mom deems “suitable.” And then there is the world of her dreams: going to film school and living in New York City—and maybe (just maybe) pursuing a boy she’s known from afar since grade school, a boy who’s finally falling into her orbit at school.

There’s also the real world, beyond Maya’s control. In the aftermath of a horrific crime perpetrated hundreds of miles away, her life is turned upside down. The community she’s known since birth becomes unrecognizable; neighbors and classmates alike are consumed with fear, bigotry, and hatred. Ultimately, Maya must find the strength within to determine where she truly belongs.

Yet another interesting read which had the potential to be something even better. It is a story of an Indian-American Muslim teen, and sheds light on how, apart from the everyday struggles of a teenager, Maya also has to battle Islamophobia on a daily basis. However, the book also tends to stereotypes Indians a tad too much which I didn’t appreciate, and again had a weak romance. However, the rest of the protagonist’s journey – especially her struggle to move away from the path her family has charted out for her in order to fulfill her dream of being a filmmaker rung true to me.

4- The Female of the Species by Mindy McGinnis

Alex Craft knows how to kill someone. And she doesn’t feel bad about it.

Three years ago, when her older sister, Anna, was murdered and the killer walked free, Alex uncaged the language she knows best—the language of violence. While her own crime goes unpunished, Alex knows she can’t be trusted among other people. Not with Jack, the star athlete who wants to really know her but still feels guilty over the role he played the night Anna’s body was discovered. And not with Peekay, the preacher’s kid with a defiant streak who befriends Alex while they volunteer at an animal shelter. Not anyone.

As their senior year unfolds, Alex’s darker nature breaks out, setting these three teens on a collision course that will change their lives forever.

This was incredibly powerful novel, my favorite read of last month. It has so much to say, and says most of it really well. It is about rape culture – how it has become so common these days that we feel its normal. It takes Alex Craft, a teenager with extreme sensitivity so rape culture, to create a dialogue about it in their small town. Alex was a wonderful protagonist. Though the morality of her actions are in question, it is also cathartic to watch her take down the perpetrators of rape culture. It was also incredibly painful to be in her head when she begins to experience what it’s like to have friends and fall in love with the first time, and begins to long to be ‘normal’ and not to ‘feel so much’. The ending was expected, but it also left me deeply moved. Highly recommended.

5- Symptoms of a Heartbreak by Sona Charaipotra

The youngest doctor in America, an Indian-American teen makes her rounds―and falls head over heels―in the contemporary romantic comedy Symptoms of a Heartbreak.

Fresh from med school, sixteen-year-old medical prodigy Saira arrives for her first day at her new job: treating children with cancer. She’s always had to balance family and friendships with her celebrity as the Girl Genius―but she’s never had to prove herself to skeptical adult co-workers while adjusting to real life-and-death stakes. And working in the same hospital as her mother certainly isn’t making things any easier.

But life gets complicated when Saira finds herself falling in love with a patient: a cute teen boy who’s been diagnosed with cancer. And when she risks her brand new career to try to improve his chances, it could cost her everything.

It turns out “heartbreak” is the one thing she still doesn’t know how to treat.

Classic case of ruining a superb premise with terrible narrative choices – the romance being the biggest blunder of them all. Why is romance a must in every YA novel? And if it all you HAVE to have it, at least make it feel organic no? Here it feels like the two characters fall in love just because the writer told them to. And Saira was a very unlikable character who struck me as a spoilt brat who got away too easily with stuff just because she is the Girl Genius. However, one thing I did like was the Indianness of this book – that’s the one part that feels more organic than anything else in this novel.

6- Suffer Love by Ashley Herring Blake

“Just let it go.”

That’s what everyone keeps telling Hadley St. Clair after she learns that her father cheated on her mother. But Hadley doesn’t want to let it go. She wants to be angry and she wants everyone in her life—her dad most of all—to leave her alone.

Sam Bennett and his family have had their share of drama too. Still reeling from a move to a new town and his parents’ recent divorce, Sam is hoping that he can coast through senior year and then move on to hassle-free, parent-free life in college. He isn’t looking for a relationship…that is, until he sees Hadley for the first time.

Hadley and Sam’s connection is undeniable, but Sam has a secret that could ruin everything. Should he follow his heart or tell the truth?

I picked up this one because I ADORED the author’s Girl Made of Stars (highly recommended). Though the book is kind of predictable (it is very obvious what Sam’s ‘secret’ could be), I was also really moved by it. Sam and Hadley are caught in a messy situation where there is no absolute right or wrong, and thankfully the author steers clear from giving their tale a neat conclusion. Not everything worked – the Shakespeare references were a little overdone. And I didn’t quite buy Sam’s resolution with his mother, who was a pretty despicable character. Hadley’s father is no saint either, but at least he tries. And there was one throwaway line the book which was quite derogatory to people of colour. But I did shed a tear or two at the end – proving that somewhere it really struck a cord.