A review by beyreads
First Love, Take Two by Sajni Patel

4.0

“I’d lived years before you and things were fine. But then I met you and every facet of the world opened up and came to life. So, when we went through a time without each other, part of me died, stayed dead until I saw you again.”

Rep: Indian heroine, Black hero
Content Warning: Anxiety, Depressive Episode, Racism, Slut-shaming, Miscarriage
Tropes: Second chance romance, Forced proximity

A sweet and heartwarming story about second chance and standing up to what is right, even at the expense of getting socially exiled off the community.

Off to a start by juggling between job hunting, familial expectations to get married ASAP, practically getting kicked out of her apartment, and anxiety, Preeti Patel tried to put on a big girl mask to keep it together in front of everyone. It is until her best friend, Liya, offered her apartment to live for three weeks… with her ex she dumped years ago, Daniel, as a package.

First Love, Take Two brought us to see what it is like to live inside Preeti’s scrambled thoughts and watch her trying to sort out everything and get through her depressive episode—while avoiding the matter to explain to Daniel about why she left him.

Not only that, we got to meet Preeti’s sinister aunties who slut-shamed her for having sex outside marriage when she dated Daniel—while lashing out blatant racism to the architect—and watch Preeti stood up for herself and her family. You go girl.

What I loved the most about this book is how it manages to create multidimensional characters despite having quite a lot of them introduced. Maybe this does not offer much Indian cultures compared to the previous book, but I had to admit that I enjoyed this book a lot more.