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jada's reviews
265 reviews
The Good Die Young: The Verdict on Henry Kissinger by Rene Rojas, Jonah Walter, Bhaskar Sunkara
challenging
fast-paced
3.0
wide, not deep
The Muslims Are Coming!: Islamophobia, Extremism, and the Domestic War on Terror by Arun Kundnani
challenging
medium-paced
5.0
Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal
funny
lighthearted
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
3.0
the latter part of the year has kinda sucked for me reading-wise. I’ve been flitting from book to book and nothing has been sticking, and this was just another brick in the wall. I finished this, so I guess that counts for something, but i didn’t feel that much of a sense of satisfaction or anything at the end. I think it was a bit too light for me, and I say that in the least pretentious way possible. Funnily enough, I fleetingly described the book as chick-lit, then i begun to wonder whether that was a derogatory or antifeminist term and that sent me down a whole research rabbit hole, so at least some brain activity came out of reading this.
Now on to the actual review: it was okay, maybe even bordering on good. I enjoyed the window into Punjabi culture it provided. I was also interested in the gradual unravelling of Maya’s story and the whole murder mystery aspect. On the other hand, I feel like the characters weren’t particularly developed or anything; I didn’t feel drawn to them much. I wasn’t that interested in the whole Jason arc either, it was fluffy at best and predictable at worst. I think that was my gripe with the whole book actually. It brought up a lot of interesting stuff (honour killings, the brotherhood enforcing honour, arranged marriages, the illiterate widows, modernity vs tradition) but they just didn’t seem to be given a satisfying conclusion. I think i would have liked something a bit deeper, maybe something that didn’t wrap up so neatly (though that’s arguable I suppose, it was a tad open-ended).
more random thoughts: i think the handling of nikki’s feminism was questionable. at the beginning, it portrays her zeal for her various causes in an almost mocking way, and at the end, when the mother says that britain gave her the freedom of choice that india couldn’t made me think about the kind of white-saviour-esque feminism that’s like “we have to save these poor brown women from their oppressive cultures”. it also got me thinking about how she helped the women explore their sexuality, but failed to teach them how to read, which is arguably a more pressing feminist issue. Not too sure where i’m going with this but there’s something in the making there.
anyways, like rwrb, it was a fun enough fluffy read that falls apart under scrutiny.