![Book Review: When Dimple Met Rishi]()
review, Romance, YA |
Do you know what is the overused word that I have been dreading to hear or read about a book? Nerds. Thanks to John Green, Chetan Bhagat and the likes, I am pushed to cringe physically when someone describes themselves as nerds. So when every book blogger I adore went crazy reviewing about the new YA on the block with two Indian leads who are nerds, I was not sure I would like the end of that melodrama. Still, I had to try it, right? Read more to find out what I feel about When Dimple Met Rishi
Book Name: When Dimple Met Rishi
Author: Sandhya Menon
Genre: Fiction – YA Romance
Characters: Dimple Shah, Rishi and Ashish Patel, Celia
Setting: San Francisco, California, The USA, India
Dimple Shah has ambitious plans for her life and has been accepted to Stanford. She wants to attend a coding camp that might give her a chance to work with her role model. But her parents have other plans for her. Rishi Patel, her parents’ choice of the groom for Dimple, arrives at the Insomnia Camp to spend time with her. Dimple ambushed by her parents hates Rishi even before she gets a chance to know him. Does her opinion about Rishi changes after she knows him better?
Rishi is the perfect first born son for his Indian parents, who follows his dad’s footsteps into computer engineering. He falls for the girl his parents chose for him and agrees to woo her at the summer program she has enlisted to. Does this arranged marriage situation end up well for his hopelessly romantic self? Does he realize what makes him happy, than just being the model son? You have to read the When Dimple Met Rishi to find out more.
Dimple and Rishi are so opposite in their beliefs and value systems, though their origin and culture are the same. While she is a rebel and wants to shine out in the world for herself before she could think of marriage, Rishi stays true to his roots and wants to fulfill his parents’ desires. They are both perfect for each other and fight hard to keep on their courses despite the fact that they were falling for each other. Oh, by the way, I totally adored the other duo (Ashish and Celia) in the story, and I am more than excited to know that there might be a follow up on their stories too.
When Dimple Met Rishi is a cute YA contemporary that would make you grin in all the right places. This short read is what one needs one a bored afternoon to lift you from your slump. Yes, there are some stereotyping towards Indians. And even as an Indian from a similar background, I could not believe these kids were just eighteen. I mean I was never that serious even then. I actually pegged Rishi to be in his late 20s or early 30s, before I had read further. You know I had already another Rishi with whom I had the same problem.
There are a few Hindi slangs but not too many to be turn-offish and the writing is so fluid and breezy that I read the book in less than three hours. Is When Dimple Met Rishi
worth all the commotion it has created by the Twittersphere and the great reviews found online? I would say a YES! If you are in the mood for a YA/romcom this season your choice is right here.
![Book Review: When Dimple Met Rishi]()
review, YA |
Everyone I know has been raving about the TV series. I have always fallen for books that had characters that dealt with dark, depressed and suicidal thoughts. I don’t think anyone likes happy, chirpy teenagers anymore. Oh we also adore nerdy, socially awkward teens. (Sarcasm, peeps).
Characters: Hannah Baker, Clay Jensen, Alex Standall, Bryce Walker, Jessica Davis, Justin Foley, Tyler Down, Courtney Crimsen, Mr. Porter, Marcus Cooley, Zach Dempsey, Ryan Shaver, Jenny Kurtz (Sherri in the series)
When I heard, or read, that 13RW is the new GoT (which I have not read or seen)I could not wait to get back to Dubai, so that I could binge watch the series. As you all would have known by now, 13 Reasons Why, or 13RW, is a Netflix’s adaption of Jay Asher’s book with the same name. Being the badass that I am, I had to grab the book and read it. And discussed it to few, by few I mean any people who would listen to me, about it. First of, this is going to be a part post. Now on to the first part, the review.
13RW talks about Hannah Baker who kills herself with no apparent reasons at bay. Her parents and Clay, her friend are at a loss trying to understand her death. But soon enough, Clay receives a packet of cassettes at his doorsteps, that has Hannah talking to him, among others narrating the reasons that lead her to suicide. He is instructed to pass on to the next person after he hears them.
The story is fast paced and absolutely un-put-down-able. I loved the clever storyline that kept us on toes till the very end. Each side of the tape talks about a reason that triggered her to die, according to her. The book and the series, both alternate between the voices of Hannah and Clay, which works very well. The series was honest to the book and the audiobook was better even (yeah I did try the audio book as well). There are some changes made to the series, which for me made better sense. But the climax in the book seemed more plausible than in the Netflix series understandably.
At some low point, most of us would have had thought ‘who would be sorry , if I were dead right now?’. Hannah takes it a little further and takes that action. For me, she is not likable, relate-able or even tolerable. I was feeling that it was like Mean girls part 2, all the way through, except we knew Mean Girls would have a good (sorta) ending. Yes people were mean to her. Boys were particularly mean to her. Friends moved on. Shit happens. That is how life is. Though I agree all these reasons could have snowballed her towards her suicide, it was her choice.
I agree that every action that people unwittingly commit, might affect others, but that does not make you responsible for their reactions. No, I do not justify their actions, nor do I appreciate Hannah vilifying everyone else. In fact almost every one of the characters had an own issue to cope up in their lives, and they have their own mechanisms. Some work, some did not. Sadly Hannah’s didn’t work and still seems a glamorous way out. The question the story poses is not ‘who killed Hannah?’ more of ‘how do we avoid another death’, though it does not come of quite that way.
While 13RW boasts about talking about suicide among teens, the taboo, I am not sure if it does enough justice to it. Just alienation at the school cannot drive one to commit suicide, without discussing the depressed feeling part. It still confounds me why is it so hard to say depression or mental illness. I have not found even a mention of it in the book or the series. I don’t get how talking against suicide, bullying and rape is encouraged and even glamorous, while depression is not. Again that topic is for another day. Oh well, that disappointed me.
I loved the story, liked the pace and writing, but I simply hate the hype around it. In short my problems with Thirteen Reasons Why
are two pronged: 1) The characters are not just flawed, they are not deep. 2) It does not talk about the relevant issues, that it boasts of. The message sent across is wrong and poorly researched. There are several loopholes in the story, but I don’t even want to go into that.
Bottom line: Read once if you wanna know what the hype is all about. If you don’t, you are missing nothing anyway. Pick it up if only books with suicide and rape are okay for you.
Paranormal, review, YA |
This week has chosen to be dark themed on its own. I have been reading on and off these days, erm.. actually took a long break from reading and that is for sure going to affect my yearly target of 52 books. I know it sounds an easy mark for few, but seems such right now a difficult one to reach. Hey don’t hold it against me, there were many books that I read and decided to not continue further.
Anyway coming back to the topic, I received ‘
The Girl Who Couldn’t Come Up With an Original Title‘ for review and I picked up not knowing that it contains two short stories both based on the above mentioned dark themes like suicide, depression and despair. All I knew was it had a intriguing and title and it came in highly recommended by Maxine herself. So go ahead find out if I was satisfied.
Author: The Behrg
Genre: Fiction – Short Story
The first short story is about ‘the girl’ who is a writer with incessant suicidal thoughts. She attempts to commit suicide thrice but fails miserably. The story starts with her struggling to find a title for her writing all through the story, falling and travelling between lines. I loved the word play and her struggle to cope up with depression and the thin gap between survival instinct and to give up and choose the easy way out.
It took a few pages for me to get into the story, and once we are past that we are worried if she is ever gonna return back to the land of normalcy. The pain of not feeling anything and having no one to speak to hits too near to home to not understand her frustration.
The second story is about another struggling writer again fighting his emotions to go ahead with his decision to die. He knows Despair too well and his tug off war with Insanity and Reluctance creates the necessary suspense in the reader to know if Dave is going ahead with his decision.
I loved the second story better even though it was shorter of the two. It was like watching the Inside Out (the movie) but only darker and more grown up. I know this may not be a fair comparison but I liked the personification of our emotions.
Both the stories wouldn’t make you love them or feel happy after you read them, many might be put off by the theme, but they struck a chord with me and make me mull over it for a while.The author’s note made a lot of sense and her call to understand and help people affected by depression and suicidal tendencies is welcome.
I picked up the book for its quirky title and I wasn’t disappointed and all in about 36 pages!
Watch out for this space where I try attempting to review one of those much hailed author’s book pretty soon!
![Book Review: When Dimple Met Rishi]()
review, Romance, YA |
So there is this book. You hear rad reviews about the author. His quotes are everywhere. And you pick it with all high hopes. Just to be sorely disappointed. Still you read on hoping it would get better. You are bored. You start doubting if it was you. You continue reading as you don’t usually quit books halfway. You now hope it will end soon. Then it does. We are talking about An Abundance of Katherines!
About the book
Book: An Abundance of Katherines
Author: John Green
Genre: Fiction – Drama, Young Adults
Main Characters: Colin Singleton, Lindsey, Hassan
Setting: Gutshot, The USA
The plot
The story starts with Colin, a prodigy being dumped by his 19th girlfriend named Katherine. Yes you heard it right. He dates only girls named Katherine, with that exact spelling.
He is heart broken and decides he is completely useless, ie, he doesn’t matter. His superpowers are he could anagram any word, can speak in several languages and socially awkward.
His only friend, Hassan takes him on a roadtrip to nowhere specific. And ends up seeing the place where Archduke Franz Ferdiand is buried (yes the guy from WW I) at Gutshot, Tennessee. Ok long story short, he makes friends with Lindsey and Hassan ends up kissing the hot girl Katrina.
After 100 pages, Colin finds a theorem that could predict the life span of any relationship and dates Lindsey. End of the story and sorry for the spoiler. Colin learns to narrate a story!
My thoughts
There you have my review about in just few sentences. I know I can’t live without talking more about it, because that is all was motivating me to finish the book.
Ok seriously, nothing ever happens in the book at all. I really tired liking it though. I particularly wasn’t liking any character at all – neither whiny, self obsessed, self absorbed so called child prodigy Colin nor the self absorbed and nothing to offer to the story female lead Lindsey. Not even the other insufferable smaller characters.
And hope you will forgive my generalizing of John Green’s books (I have read three now), but I still have to find any person, let alone teens, being so nerdy (again forgive me using the most over used word in the past few years). Seriously I am yet to meet even one single person who actually speaks like any of these characters
And if you knew where ever they were hiding, please please let me know – I really need to make friends with them. But these characters in all of his stories seem to have the best of friends – equally nerdy ones. Come on, it is killing me. Be it Hazel and Augustus from The Fault in Our Stars, or Alaska and Sam from Looking for Alaska, or every one (Collin, Hassan and Lindsey) from AOK.
If I hate him creating too good to be true, ‘unique’ characters and making my normal life miserable, I wish him hell for making socially dysfunctional to be cool. We have had enough off the same churn. Dear Mr Green show us real life characters, I understand it is a book of fiction but I am not interested in old wine in new bottle, even if we had liked the old wine.
I tried really hard to like the book and went to the extent of bookmarking favorite quotes and stuff – but after a while I felt I was doing the same thing Colin / Green did – searching for something that would matter when there was absolutely no other sense at all.
I am actually frightened to say this aloud, is John Green the western version of Chetan Bhagat? His characters are smarter, I get it. But there are too many of clichés thar keep repeating and making me feel so.
Quotes that worked for me
Ok now for some of those over hyped quotes:
“Books are the ultimate Dumpees: put them down and they’ll wait for you forever; pay attention to them and they always love you back.”
“If people could see me the way I see myself – if they could live in my memories – would anyone love me?”
“He liked the mere act of reading, the magic of turning scratches on a page into words inside his head.”
“You don’t remember what happened. What you remember becomes what happened.”
Bottom-line
In conclusion, AOK was an ok read, but yet another book that let me down mainly because of the hype around.
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Let us chat
Have you read this one? Did this review ended up being too much rant-y? Let us talk.
![Book Review: When Dimple Met Rishi]()
review, Romance, YA |
caI quickly needed a short and sunny read to wash out the bad after taste of the last book I read, and I picked out ‘Lola and the Boy Next Door on an impulse. I had wanted to read the Anna and the French kiss before this book, being the first of the series and all, but couldn’t find it on my book pile.
At a time when my Facebook wall is filled with pompous quotes from Augustus and Hazel from The Fault in Our Stars, Lola’s teenage love story came out as a refresher. It accomplished what I wished for. A quick breezy, light hearted distraction from all the chaos around me, without trying to be more than what it is. Don’t get me wrong, I do love reading about nerdy teens, even nerdy dying teens but that was not exactly what I wanted read just now.
Book: Lola and the Boy Next Door
Author: Stephanie Perkins
Genre: Fiction – Romance;, Young Adult
Main Characters: Lola Nolan (Dolores Nolan), Cricket Bell, Calliope Bell, Max, Andy and Nathan Nolan, Norah Nolan
Setting: San Francisco, California, The USA
Dolores Nolan, a costume designer of 17, almost perfect daughter to her two dads and a part time worker at movie theatre. She is desperately in love with Max who is all coolness personified – a tattooed band musician with bleached hair roots of 22 years. She is pretty smitten over him, much like her namesake. She tries to earn her fathers’ blessings and freedom from their Sunday brunches with her boyfriend and check-ins through hourly calls. The parents and her best friend, Lindsey try to voice their concern over their age difference.
The story takes a turn when her first love, Cricket Bell (More about the name later) and his family return to their house after two years. Lola is unable to choose between cool and older Max or the childhood best friend and sweetheart, nerdy Cricket.
I loved the writing. It is a simple story, boy-girl break up, girl dates someone else, boy-girl meet again, gets back together after heart aches (and few sad tunes if it were a movie). I liked the way each character was described just the right depth without dragging the story line, yet deep enough to understand them.
I found it really hard to like Lola – for a 17 year old she is pretty dumb to be chasing a 22 old guy. Wait, that’s love – I am overlooking it. But she is too selfish, lying pretty much to everyone, ditching her best friend, and letting Max walk over Lindsey at every opportunity and then later gets completely dependent on Cricket for everything.
And what was the author thinking when she named a lead ‘Cricket’? He is Mr. Nice that’s it. Nothing to be liked about nor hated. But when he is with Lola he is just happy being a doormat. Wait again, it is love. Then what is this being a toy to his possessive sister? Both the male and female leads didn’t personally appeal to me, but I liked the mushy love story.
Oh, there is also yet another love story on the sidelines, Anna and St Clair from the book one, which made me feel I have to read that book but not right now. I will wait for my next mood out or another bad book 😉
![Book Review: When Dimple Met Rishi]()
Drama, review, YA |
used to love to hate Chetan Bhagat I take back my words, comparing to this book CB looks like a mature writer. I had to finish this book in one shot, so that I wont have to start the next day with Oh Shit Not Again.
About Oh Shit Not Again
Book: Oh Shit Not Again
Author: Mandar Kokate
Genre: Fiction – Drama
Main Characters: Raj, Arti, Seema, Andy, Sam, Neha, Sejal
Setting: India
What I was promised
Have you ever experienced what happens when a porn movie is mistakenly played in front of your grandma and the CD player refuses to stop’
Have you ever experienced what happens when mixture of vodka and soft drink is served to hundreds of people gathered for a party’
Have you ever experienced what happens when a boy is kicked in the groin by a girl when he attempts to kiss her’
Have you ever experienced what happens when a college-going student has an affair with a married woman whose husband carts a gun’
Have you ever experienced what happens when you are conspired into a murder that you had merely witnessed’
Welcome to hilarious story of five friends named Raj (the flirt chap), Arti (the sweet female lead), Andy (the creepy leader), and Sam (the biggest problem of Raj’s messed up life). These people can answer all the above questions in this fun tickling novel. Are you ready to experience the roller coaster ride of events? If yes, then sit back and enjoy!
What I expected
A “Five Point someone / One night at Call centre” (Aka other CB books) type story. And seriously all these instances happening to five different people. I confess that I did like the First “Five Point Someone”.
Reason I say first is because there have been many stories that have followed this pattern, that it lost its charm. It was after I read the Inscrutable Americans that I knew the “first Five Point Someone” was not first of its kind.
What I got:
Take the situations from the blurb + add a dumb.. no no.. pathetic, stupid male protagonist + crappy writing + bad bad bad plots from a badly made B grade Bollywood movies + lots and lots of masala, sleazy moves, sex = Oh shit not again !!!!
Book review of Oh shit not again
Reading through the blurb of Oh Shit Not Again, I thought it should be quite interesting “without reading the reviews”. That is where I went wrong.. The protagonist – a (pathetic) guy in search of “love??”” huh?? Oh, is that why he thinks every time he approaches a girl physically he thinks it is love… Bullshit… How do all the troubles in the world get attracted to him? And he accepts everything? No, I dont want to talk about this guy Raj again.. ever..
Love interest – First of all, there is no love.. He seems to get attracted to every woman in the plot with the same sexual notion and then he calls them love.. Arti, Neha and Sejal.. Oh come on.. and Seema too?
So a few drops of tears and Raj accepts to act as an illicit boyfriend to Sejal, whom he didnt even know a day earlier? It could not become more filmy when Raj announces to marry Sejal. Let me not go into that one..
Is there nothing called sanity in this piece of writing?
And all this crap takes place in a week, maximum?
Note to Self: Never read a book without reading the review(s).
P.S :
‘Beware before you read……
you may die laughing……’
Oh Come on!!! I could not take the irritant look off my face till I closed the book..
P. S (1)
BTW, How do you hold someone’s neck, “from end to end” ?
Dimple and Rishi are so opposite in their beliefs and value systems, though their origin and culture are the same. While she is a rebel and wants to shine out in the world for herself before she could think of marriage, Rishi stays true to his roots and wants to fulfill his parents’ desires. They are both perfect for each other and fight hard to keep on their courses despite the fact that they were falling for each other. Oh, by the way, I totally adored the other duo (Ashish and Celia) in the story, and I am more than excited to know that there might be a follow up on their stories too.
