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A review by littlekinggone
Born Confused by Tanuja Desai Hidier
3.0
This book does a lot of things really well, and it tackles a lot of big themes and questions. Dimple comes from a family of Indian immigrants and trying to balance her culture with American expectations has not been easy for her. As she goes into the summer before her senior year of high school, she is pushed to confront her previous ideas of her culture, identity, friendship, and love.
The Good:
Dimple is an endearing character. I identified with her quite a bit. She's quiet but compassionate. She hides behind her camera and tends to let her insecurities push her around a bit. She grew a lot through this story, and I enjoyed watching her grow into herself.
As far as side characters go, Gwyn gave me the biggest headache. I constantly wanted to reach in and shake some sense into her. She's selfish and self-serving, often pushing Dimple aside for her own needs. Their friendship hits a necessary speed bump, and it felt genuine and realistic. I remembered going through something similar in high school AND college (unfortunately).
One of the strong suits here is the diversity. Dimple is a POC. Her love interest is a POC. Their families are POC. A majority of their friends are POC. There are lesbians and drag queens and SO MUCH VARIETY AND CULTURE. I loved it. Hidier does an excellent job of submersing readers into the Indian culture. There are discussions of intersectionality and cultural appropriation that had a contextual basis with the plot. It was really well done. I wish more YA lit had the guts to tackle that as tastefully as she does.
The Bad:
There isn't really anything bad here. Usually this bad section will be dedicated to all the things that make me mad while I'm reading but there was none of that here. There are just a few things I thought could have been done better.
There's a lot of purple prose. I dug in to some of it and skimmed other sections. I want to say the book as a whole could have been shorter but I don't want to sacrifice the wonderful growth that happens during it. But! It matches Dimple's character. She's a thinker and philosopher. The beginning was also a little slow to start. It took about 200 pages for me to engage with the story. But again, I'm not sure how to cut that down without sacrificing the backstory and culture that's necessary for later.
I really liked Karsh as a whole. He's sweet and thoughtful with a good backstory. But that second meeting at the club felt a little manic pixie-ish? Like he suddenly swoops in and can rattle off Dimple's entire character to her and how she needs to believe in herself and shares his life story, etc. It felt a little soon considering they had said maybe two words together in their first meeting.
Overall, very enjoyable. I'm not sure I'll read the sequel based off the Goodreads reviews, but I think a lot of YA can take notes for how to tackle the hard subjects.
The Good:
Dimple is an endearing character. I identified with her quite a bit. She's quiet but compassionate. She hides behind her camera and tends to let her insecurities push her around a bit. She grew a lot through this story, and I enjoyed watching her grow into herself.
As far as side characters go, Gwyn gave me the biggest headache. I constantly wanted to reach in and shake some sense into her. She's selfish and self-serving, often pushing Dimple aside for her own needs. Their friendship hits a necessary speed bump, and it felt genuine and realistic. I remembered going through something similar in high school AND college (unfortunately).
One of the strong suits here is the diversity. Dimple is a POC. Her love interest is a POC. Their families are POC. A majority of their friends are POC. There are lesbians and drag queens and SO MUCH VARIETY AND CULTURE. I loved it. Hidier does an excellent job of submersing readers into the Indian culture. There are discussions of intersectionality and cultural appropriation that had a contextual basis with the plot. It was really well done. I wish more YA lit had the guts to tackle that as tastefully as she does.
The Bad:
There isn't really anything bad here. Usually this bad section will be dedicated to all the things that make me mad while I'm reading but there was none of that here. There are just a few things I thought could have been done better.
There's a lot of purple prose. I dug in to some of it and skimmed other sections. I want to say the book as a whole could have been shorter but I don't want to sacrifice the wonderful growth that happens during it. But! It matches Dimple's character. She's a thinker and philosopher. The beginning was also a little slow to start. It took about 200 pages for me to engage with the story. But again, I'm not sure how to cut that down without sacrificing the backstory and culture that's necessary for later.
I really liked Karsh as a whole. He's sweet and thoughtful with a good backstory. But that second meeting at the club felt a little manic pixie-ish? Like he suddenly swoops in and can rattle off Dimple's entire character to her and how she needs to believe in herself and shares his life story, etc. It felt a little soon considering they had said maybe two words together in their first meeting.
Overall, very enjoyable. I'm not sure I'll read the sequel based off the Goodreads reviews, but I think a lot of YA can take notes for how to tackle the hard subjects.