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A review by loveambreen
Born Confused by Tanuja Desai Hidier
5.0
This book meant so much to me as a teenager when being desi wasn't ever a thing I saw in YAs, so I resisted rereading it for so many years because I really worried that a more mature reading would taint my positive memories. But wow, that really wasn't the case at all, because this book hit home just as hard at twenty-seven as it did at fifteen.
It's not a perfect book, don't get me wrong. A few times I was like "you can't say that," but they were far apart and might have been more "acceptable" sixteen years ago. The dynamic between Karsh and Gwyn made my cringe every time they interacted, but it also felt very true to a romance YA novel so I can't fault it too much for that. After all, the book is told by a seventeen year old Dimple, so some things are gonna be cringey.
But this book tries. It could have easily been just about Dimple and Karsh, but the addition of Kavita and Zara and Radha and Dimple's parents and all these different desi journeys brought so much more to the plate.
Without getting into too many spoilers, this book succeeds in a way that some other novels (looking at you Paths of Marriage) fail because it embraces the diversity of being Indian, it embraces the cultural nuances, and it normalizes being Indian and American and anything else you are.
Born Confused isn't about molding yourself into certain labels, it's about molding the labels to fit who you are, because who you are (baggage and all) is worth embracing.
It's not a perfect book, don't get me wrong. A few times I was like "you can't say that," but they were far apart and might have been more "acceptable" sixteen years ago. The dynamic between Karsh and Gwyn made my cringe every time they interacted, but it also felt very true to a romance YA novel so I can't fault it too much for that. After all, the book is told by a seventeen year old Dimple, so some things are gonna be cringey.
But this book tries. It could have easily been just about Dimple and Karsh, but the addition of Kavita and Zara and Radha and Dimple's parents and all these different desi journeys brought so much more to the plate.
Without getting into too many spoilers, this book succeeds in a way that some other novels (looking at you Paths of Marriage) fail because it embraces the diversity of being Indian, it embraces the cultural nuances, and it normalizes being Indian and American and anything else you are.
Born Confused isn't about molding yourself into certain labels, it's about molding the labels to fit who you are, because who you are (baggage and all) is worth embracing.