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A review by rbruehlman
Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal
2.0
This book was soooooo boring. I hate-read it to finish it as quickly as possible.
This book tells the story of a British-Punjabi woman, Nikki, who begins teaching a writing class to widowed Punjabi women. Said writing class eventually takes on a life of its own with the women delighting in recording illicit stories that shake the conservative community. Mixed in is solving a murder mystery.
My biggest problem with this book was how unrealistic it felt. I simply can't see a whole group of widowed elderly Punjabi women getting together to write smut. I can't see a whole group of widowed elderly women ... or elderly women ... or just most women or people at all. I mean, yeah, okay, maybe a group of women or men might get together to write this stuff, but for it to cause a sensation in the community where scores of people start showing up, and the stories are photocopied and shared everywhere? I guess I just found the impact and growth of the classes very hard to believe, in any community, not just a conservative Punjabi one.
I struggled to connect with the characters in the book, as well. I never grew fond of Nikki, and Kulwinder was hard to like for most of the book. I liked the widows okay, but they never got much characterization outside of their storytelling, and they also didn't seem to grow. It felt like they came into class from practically the first day looking to tell sultry stories, and continued doing that for the entire book. I am not really sure what Nikki's presence provided them beyond a space and time.
The murder mystery felt forced, as well. While I sympathized with Kulwinder's pain and thought it made her a more interesting character, I would have preferred the murder not be solved via Nikki's involvement, because it felt contrived. On the other hand, if there had been no murder and no Jaggi, then the book wouldn't have had any suspense or plot, because, again, the widows didn't seem to grow as people at all.
As for the stories the women were recording ... not gonna lie, I started skipping over them. They were boring. Not my thing, I guess!
The one thing I did like about the book was learning about Punjabi culture. That I found interesting.
This book tells the story of a British-Punjabi woman, Nikki, who begins teaching a writing class to widowed Punjabi women. Said writing class eventually takes on a life of its own with the women delighting in recording illicit stories that shake the conservative community. Mixed in is solving a murder mystery.
My biggest problem with this book was how unrealistic it felt. I simply can't see a whole group of widowed elderly Punjabi women getting together to write smut. I can't see a whole group of widowed elderly women ... or elderly women ... or just most women or people at all. I mean, yeah, okay, maybe a group of women or men might get together to write this stuff, but for it to cause a sensation in the community where scores of people start showing up, and the stories are photocopied and shared everywhere? I guess I just found the impact and growth of the classes very hard to believe, in any community, not just a conservative Punjabi one.
I struggled to connect with the characters in the book, as well. I never grew fond of Nikki, and Kulwinder was hard to like for most of the book. I liked the widows okay, but they never got much characterization outside of their storytelling, and they also didn't seem to grow. It felt like they came into class from practically the first day looking to tell sultry stories, and continued doing that for the entire book. I am not really sure what Nikki's presence provided them beyond a space and time.
The murder mystery felt forced, as well. While I sympathized with Kulwinder's pain and thought it made her a more interesting character, I would have preferred the murder not be solved via Nikki's involvement, because it felt contrived. On the other hand, if there had been no murder and no Jaggi, then the book wouldn't have had any suspense or plot, because, again, the widows didn't seem to grow as people at all.
As for the stories the women were recording ... not gonna lie, I started skipping over them. They were boring. Not my thing, I guess!
The one thing I did like about the book was learning about Punjabi culture. That I found interesting.