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bellaob 's review for:
The Love Match
by Priyanka Taslim
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
It’s a sweet book, and as a lesbian with lots of close Muslim friends I absolutely loved the Muslim LGBT rep, especially in a time when people are so quick to use pinkwashing to justify Islamophobia. Really great in general to see such good Bangladeshi rep as it’s not something I’ve come across in this genre before. Extra .5 stars just for that because representation really is important.
However as for the book itself I found it a bit over the top and the main character quite unlikeable. She thinks very highly of herself and constantly talks about being responsible and wanting adults to respect her decisions but then goes about behaving in the most unhinged and immature ways. I know people say that teenagers are silly, but I don’t think I was a teenager that long ago and one of my siblings still is, and none of us act(ed) like this. I’m pretty sure not telling your friend’s deepest secret to his strict parents is a level of social skill you learn at around the age of 10 if not earlier. I nearly choked when Zahra had the audacity to suggest that Harun’s distance was maybe because he was never sincere about their friendship, rather than the fact that she had just totally betrayed him in pursuit of her tortured artist poverty porn dream boy, who she’d only known for a month and drops five minutes later when she realises he’s not actually all that great. Never mind when she asks why her mother looks mortified when running into Harun’s family, after she is actively rude to them at the celebration they are kindly hosting, and eats custardy fruit with her hands and rubs it all over her face to deliberately inspire disgust, setting an example that has her little sister also behaving badly and embarrassing their whole family.
And she’s not the only of the young characters who is extremely entitled/immature - Dani throwing a tantrum because her parents won’t let her use her probably very hard-earned college savings for travel fun money to go see her girlfriend is unbelievable levels of spoilt. This coming from myself whose parents were relatively supportive of her being in a long distance (different country) relationship at the age of 18 when starting uni, but I would never have dreamed of expecting them to fund it.
I did also find it slightly funny that despite frequent acknowledgement of the problematic nature of Eurocentric beauty standards, the ‘heroine’ then states herself as meeting all of these criteria and therefore doesn’t really meaningfully challenge them. This alongside some other sloppy physical clichés like the love interest having “golden” eyes.
I’ll allow that some of my frustration with this book may have been exacerbated by the audio narrator (already not my preferred method of engaging with a book). The narrator on the edition I listened to had the extremely painful whiny American vocal fry combination, and Harun’s passages sounded like he was constantly straining to go to the toilet. She also frequently mispronounced words (not the Bengali prononciations, I am in no position to say whether they are correct/authentic), but just standard pronunciation of words like recalcitrance/ haphazard/ beatifically. I appreciate that these are words which may be challenging if you have only ever seen them written down, especially for people with reading issues such as dyslexia, but if you’re professionally producing an audiobook you/someone else should probably check, especially when the mistakes aren’t a one-off but so frequent as to be remarkable.
Perhaps at 26 I’m just already too old for the target audience of this book and it will land better with the true YA teenage demographic.
However as for the book itself I found it a bit over the top and the main character quite unlikeable. She thinks very highly of herself and constantly talks about being responsible and wanting adults to respect her decisions but then goes about behaving in the most unhinged and immature ways. I know people say that teenagers are silly, but I don’t think I was a teenager that long ago and one of my siblings still is, and none of us act(ed) like this. I’m pretty sure not telling your friend’s deepest secret to his strict parents is a level of social skill you learn at around the age of 10 if not earlier. I nearly choked when Zahra had the audacity to suggest that Harun’s distance was maybe because he was never sincere about their friendship, rather than the fact that she had just totally betrayed him in pursuit of her tortured artist poverty porn dream boy, who she’d only known for a month and drops five minutes later when she realises he’s not actually all that great. Never mind when she asks why her mother looks mortified when running into Harun’s family, after she is actively rude to them at the celebration they are kindly hosting, and eats custardy fruit with her hands and rubs it all over her face to deliberately inspire disgust, setting an example that has her little sister also behaving badly and embarrassing their whole family.
And she’s not the only of the young characters who is extremely entitled/immature - Dani throwing a tantrum because her parents won’t let her use her probably very hard-earned college savings for travel fun money to go see her girlfriend is unbelievable levels of spoilt. This coming from myself whose parents were relatively supportive of her being in a long distance (different country) relationship at the age of 18 when starting uni, but I would never have dreamed of expecting them to fund it.
I did also find it slightly funny that despite frequent acknowledgement of the problematic nature of Eurocentric beauty standards, the ‘heroine’ then states herself as meeting all of these criteria and therefore doesn’t really meaningfully challenge them. This alongside some other sloppy physical clichés like the love interest having “golden” eyes.
I’ll allow that some of my frustration with this book may have been exacerbated by the audio narrator (already not my preferred method of engaging with a book). The narrator on the edition I listened to had the extremely painful whiny American vocal fry combination, and Harun’s passages sounded like he was constantly straining to go to the toilet. She also frequently mispronounced words (not the Bengali prononciations, I am in no position to say whether they are correct/authentic), but just standard pronunciation of words like recalcitrance/ haphazard/ beatifically. I appreciate that these are words which may be challenging if you have only ever seen them written down, especially for people with reading issues such as dyslexia, but if you’re professionally producing an audiobook you/someone else should probably check, especially when the mistakes aren’t a one-off but so frequent as to be remarkable.
Perhaps at 26 I’m just already too old for the target audience of this book and it will land better with the true YA teenage demographic.