megancmahon 's review for:

Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal

4.0

adventurous emotional hopeful medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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Spoilers!

This was spicier than I thought it'd be! That's on me, though - "erotic" is in the title.

What I liked:

• Nikki's character progression was great, to forgiving herself and letting go of her guilt towards her father. The revelation of how he died was HILARIOUS. At first I didn't like her; she seemed snobbish and a little condescending, but she definitely gets called out for it and learns and grows. I liked her shiny spine when it came to Jason (who definitely screwed up)
• I loved Kulwinder. Maya might have been my favourite character; this story captivated me from the very start
• I liked how she dealt with Tamparal, who, after being married at 10, finally got to experience pleasure and thus could be easily manipulated by the giver. She was still a villain, but her motivations were great 
• I loved Sheena and I wanted more of her. We got to know a lot of the side characters really well, actually, for the short time they were on screen! That's a real authorial gift
• I loved the ending.

What I didn't:

• I sort of wanted the Brothers to be more relevant and present, because they were great villains. I wanted some hijinks trying to avoid them, but maybe this way was better - Jaswal says that there'll always be people like that around, but they should be irrelevant to the way you live your life
• I think this book needed a good edit; there were a few spelling mistakes and even one case of a missing word

Overall I really enjoyed this. I'll never look at ghee the same way again. I'll definitely be picking up more of Jaswal's works!