The Unexpected Son

Title: The Unexpected Son

Author: Shobhan Bantwal

Published: 2010

Genre: Fiction

Rating: 3 out of 5

I have read Shobhan Bantwal's books before and haven't been impressed by her writing. I feel that the plot of her stories is good but the narration along the way loses strength and the story becomes stale.

Vinita Shelke-Patil lives in New Jersey and is married to Girish Patil for nearly 25 years and has a 23 years old daughter Arya. Vinita receives a letter from India written by an anonymous person which says that her son has cancer and in need of help and her brother Vishal could provide more details. She thinks back about 30 years when she was in college and in love with a local goon. As a result, she is pregnant and despite her family's pressure to abort, she decides to keep the baby. During birth, Vinita is sick and loses her baby, or at least that's what she was told.

Later she meets Girish, marries him, and lives a happy life. After she receives the letter, her husband Girish is upset that she kept the secret for 25 years and now she is traveling to India to meet her sick son and help him with a bone marrow transplant. Vinita confronts her family back in India for keeping her son a secret and meets her son who was adopted by a couple who live in the same town. She finds out that the adoptive father and the actual father of her son Rohit are arch-rivals and are leaders of two different groups fighting for heritage and could even kill each other. Vinita stays in Palgaum for an extended period of time trying to donate bone marrow to Rohit but ends up malaria. She meets Rohit's actual father and asks him to help his only son, but he denies it. While all this is going on, her married life is turbulent since her husband Girish neither speaks to her over the phone nor communicates through e-mail. Vinita is now worried that Girish is planning to file for a divorce. The end was surprising but stale.

Shobhan has written about Palgaum which I feel is Belgaum, located on the border of Karnataka and Maharashtra, where clashes for language and heritage are still alive today. The middle-class family of Shelkes and the adolescent years have been written very well. Arya's character is very mature for her age and is very broad-minded to accept her mother's past. The coverage of local politics was completely pointless and unnecessary. Some of the chapters were pointless and had nothing significant. 

I was neither impressed with the story nor the writing. I don't think I will read another book by Shobhan Bantwal unless it is exceptionally good.

Favorite lines from the book:

• Happiness was only a state of mind, a fleeting and fragile condition that could be shattered in an instant.
• Fate was an odd thing. Events returned full circle sometimes, leaving one helpless and struggling against the tide.
• Anger is such a wasted emotion when you don't know whether you'll be alive next week or not.

Funny In Farsi

Title: Funny In Farsi

Author: Firoozeh Dumas

Published: 2004

Genre: Memoir

Rating: 5 out of 5

This book was recommended by my colleague who said 'I am sure you will like it and enjoy it', and I did!

A fun-filled memoir of an Iranian, Firoozeh who moved to the US in 1972 when she was seven. Her father who studied in the US speaks highly about the US but Firoozeh and her mother are clueless since they do not have firsthand knowledge of the country and do not know English.

Being from Asia, I could relate to Firoozeh culturally. I had wondered about some of the same things which she mentions in the book (hushpuppies and hotdogs??!). It was good to read the interview by Khalid Hosseini who also comes from similar background culturally.

Firoozeh Dumas also writes about the painful part of the history Iranians lived, when Americans were held hostage in Tehran. It must have been tough on the Iranian community back then when they did not have to do anything with the hostage situation.

Overall, I had a great time reading this book and some really LOL (I mean really out loud) moments in the book.

Favorite lines from the book -

• At an age, when most parents are guiding their kids toward independence, my mother was hanging on to me for her dear life.
• I wanted to tell her that Mickey was the reason I was lost in the first place. Had I not been trying to talk to him on those so-called phones, I wouldn't be sitting here. I didn't owe that rodent anything.
• For American friends, "a visiting relative" meant a three-night stay. In my family, relatives' stays were marked by seasons, not nights.
• Seeing our puzzled expressions, she showed us a picture of a beautiful, long-haired cat. "It's a Persian cat," she said. That was news to us; the only cats we had ever seen back home were the mangy strays that ate scraps behind people's houses.
• I now had two hurdles to overcome, fear of water and fear of being in the water with my father.
• Perhaps the greatest irony in the wave of Iranian-hating was that Iranians, as a group, are among the most educated and successful immigrants in this country. Nobody asked our opinions of whether the hostages should be taken, and yet every single Iranian in America was paying the price. One kid throws a spitball and the whole class gets detention.
•  My mother learned what she knows about dating from Days of our lives. The only dates my father knew about contained pits.

The Woman He Loved Before

Title: The Woman He Loved Before

Author: Dorothy Koomson

Published: 2013

Genre: Fiction

Rating: 3 out of 5

Again, this book was recommended by Goodreads. The story sounded interesting too. Somehow I have been reading books by European authors lately and like their style of writing.

Libby (Liberty) meets Jack in a car dealership and thinks he is arrogant. Jack portrayed as a sweet person hunts Libby and long story short, both end up getting married. Jack is still not over grieving over his first wife Eve, who died in an accidental fall. Jack is still in love with Eve and not ready to let go of her. Jack and Libby are in a car accident and series of events happening after the accident make Libby feel that Jack was the one who killed Eve. One day she finds Eve's diaries in the basement and knows she is in danger of being killed too. Eve writes about herself even before she met Jack.

Jack seems like a very loving and caring husband to both Eve and Libby. Libby, even after being married to Jack for two years isn't sure if she took her decision in a haste but sees that Jack is still in love with Eve. Life is really not fair with some people, and Eve was one of them. Despite that, she sounded like a very strong person to put her physical and emotional scars behind after she married Jack.

The book is about love, choices, and consequences of how the present is affected by the choices we made in the past. I liked the way Koomson has written about Libby being confident and how she is shattered about her self-esteem after the accident.  The story was captivating, but the ending was pretty bland. The end was definitely not as strong as the entire book, hence only three stars. In all, I would suggest this for a beach read.

Favorite lines from the book :

• I would rather have nothing than something that was only alright.
• Money isn't the root of all evil; the love of money isn't the root of all evil; the NEED for money is the root of all evil.
• No matter how much you love a man, always have a stash of money that would get you as far away from him as possible in an emergency.
• When you love someone, them being hurt is worse than any pain that you could suffer.

Before I Fall

Author: Lauren Oliver

Published: 2010
Genre: Fiction

Rating: 3 out of 5

This is my first book by Lauren  Oliver. This book was recommended by Goodreads and after reading the description, decided to read it. "What if you only had one day to live? What would you do?" caught my attention.

Samantha Kingston (Sam), Ally, Elody, and Lindsay are a group of friends and are popular (in a mean way) in their high school. Sam has a boyfriend Rob and a good friend Kent. All the girls bully Juliet Sykes. February 12th, which is a 'Cupid Day' should have been like any ordinary day for Sam. All of them attend the party at Kent's home that night and end up in a car accident. Then Sam wakes up, only to find out, it's Friday, February 12 again. Sam goes through the same experience of the same dream six more times and tries to analyze the meaning behind her experience and the actions of everyone around her including herself.

Lauren Oliver has a keen insight and a brutal view of high school life including friendship, bullying, cruelty, and carelessness of kids. The first few chapters were not particularly interesting, but in the later chapters, as Sam tries to perfect her last day and analyze people and situations, it gets interesting. Sam tries to perfect her last day by doing things differently to her family, friends, and herself.

The plot was good but felt it was a bit draggy. The story left me thinking, that anyone could go through that, even grownups and it’s never too late to change anything. Even as grownups, we tend to hold anger and grudge towards someone, and if we really think and analyze the situation, people, and ourselves, I am sure one is able to let go of all the bitter feelings.

I would recommend this book mostly to young adults. I am interested to read more books by this author.

Forgot to mention – On page 50, it says “like when you hear thunder and know that any second you’ll see lightning tearing across the sky”. As far as I know, it’s the lightning which comes first, then the thunder! Light travels faster than sound.

Favorite lines from the book :

• Some things are better left buried and forgotten.
• Most of the time, one night blends into the next, and weeks blend into weeks and months into other months. And sooner or later, we all die.
• A good friend keeps your secrets for you. A best friend helps you keep your own secrets.
• Here’s another thing to remember; hope keeps you alive. Even when you’re dead, it’s the only thing that keeps you alive.
• That’s the best thing about best friends. That’s what they do. They keep you from spinning off the edge.
• It amazes me how easy it is for things to change, how easy it is to start off down the same road you always take and wind up somewhere new. Just one false step, one pause, one detour, and you end up with new friends or a bad reputation or a boyfriend or a breakup. It’s never occurred to me before; I’ve never been able to see it. And it makes me feel, weirdly, like maybe all of these different possibilities exist at the same time, like each moment we live has a thousand other moments layered underneath it that look different.
• So many things become beautiful when you really look.
• I shiver, thinking about how easy it is to be totally wrong about people – to see one tiny part of them and confuse it for the whole, to see the cause and think it’s the effect or vice versa.
• The scariest secret of all, the part we’re trying to forget.
• Sometimes I’m afraid of what I’m leaving behind.
• I guess that’s what saying goodbye is always like – like jumping off an edge. The worst part is making the choice to do it. Once you’re in the air, there’s nothing you can do but let go.

The Namesake

Title: The Namesake

Author: Jhumpa Lahiri

Published: 2004

Genre: Fiction

Rating: 5 out of 5

I have been planning to read this book for quite a while now. Tried to read it two times before but some things in life took priority over reading the book. I had watched the movie a long time ago (and I hardly remember scenes from the movie which is good for reading the book). This is my first book by Jhumpa Lahiri.

Her style of writing is excellent with simple English and made me feel like one of the characters in the book.

Being an immigrant myself, I can totally relate to Ashima and Ashoke about the life they live - missing family, bringing up kids, new things to learn, meeting new friends, adapting oneself to the new environment and the culture clash kids go through sometimes.

The two scenes in the book was very touching to me where Gogol feels what his parents might have felt when their parents died and wonders how did they live here with such courage being on their own. The second one was the last chapter when Ashima is packing up her stuff after selling the house. That is written in such detail that I could see Ashima right in front of me doing everything as I read.

Overall it's a good book. I also felt that it was much difficult to bring up kids in a different culture in the 70s-80s than it is now. But I would think one would enjoy it more if one has a bit of knowledge about Indian culture and immigrant life.

Favorite lines from the book:

• He is terrified to see his mother, more than he had been to see his father's body in the morgue. He knows now the guilt that his parents carried inside, at being able to do nothing when their parents had died in India, of arriving weeks, sometimes months later, when there was nothing left to do.

•  For thirty-three years she missed her life in India. Now she will miss her job at the library, the women with whom she's worked. She will miss throwing parties. She will miss living with her daughter, the surprising companionship they have formed, going into Cambridge together to see old movies at the Brattle, teaching her to cook the food Sonia had complained of eating as a child. Se will miss the opportunity to drive, as she sometimes does on her way home from the library, to the university past the engineering building where her husband once worked. She will miss the country in which she had grown to know and love her husband. Though his ashes have been scattered into the Ganges, it is here, in this house and in this town, that he will continue to dwell in her mind.

Me Before You

Author: Jojo Moyes

Published: 2012

Genre: Fiction

Rating: 5 out of 5

"Don't think of me too often. I don't want to think of you getting all maudlin. Just live well. Just live."

Finished the book in three days just because I couldn't keep this book down and while reading the last chapter had to close the book five times just to wipe my tears and get my mind straight to continue! I resisted reading the last chapter so many times just to see how it ended. The best book I have read about true love. Fell in love with Will in the first couple of paragraphs. Lou tries hard to tell him "There is more to life, you just need to see" In all the ways she could keep the hope alive for a better life for Will. The book took me on a roller coaster ride of smiles, laughs, curiosity, hope, and tears. I was panicking and nervous anticipating how the book would end. I wasn't truly prepared for the beauty of this book. As soon as I was finished reading this book, I was ready to read it again!

All the characters are likable and no unnecessary incidents. The chapters from the character's view were good, though I wish there was one from Will's perspective. But guess it was very hard for the author to pen.

PS: 5* - are you kidding me....I would give it a 10!