Today we’re finishing up A Bollywood Affair by Sonali Dev. We usually post our sister read-alongs in three parts, but this time we’re putting parts 2 & 3 into one post.
As we read, our texts were flying. Here’s what we were thinking through the middle third:
Holly: Mili says “The entire household does not need to see my chromosomes.”
Amanda: That almost made me snort inappropriately while trying to tell my child to go to sleep.
Holly: That was basically the point.
Amanda: I feel like I’m actually watching a Bollywood movie right now. This is amazing. You should have had an Indian wedding. (Uh, with no offense to your husband or your actual lovely wedding!
Holly: Tell that too [redacted name of former Indian crush]!* (And, no offense taken, obv). Oh, and I saw on the author’s website that her next book is called The Bollywood Bride.
*And now we shall see if my husband is a faithful GIAO reader.
Amanda: BTW, let’s go for Indian food.
And from there, we forged on through the final third of the book, continuing to laugh hysterically – well, until things got sad for a while..
Amanda: I am going to have to finish this book now.
Amanda: Um wow. It’s getting hot in here.
Holly: Dude, I do not post about the steaminess of books. Posts about steaminess make me mildly uncomfortable.
Amanda: [Tries to think of something that can amuse me and make Holly mildly uncomfortable…]
Amanda: I will say I don’t have a lot of familiarity with Indian culture, so I thought a few things were interesting about the relationships with daughters. Seeing Mili’s friend’s mother yelling “you stupid cow” to her daughter versus the excitement of a new baby girl to a new generation really stuck out to me. I loved that Mili wasn’t just trying to empower herself, but that she also wanted more for other women. I just loved Mili and her hope and her naivete, matched against her strength, intelligence and her determination.
Holly: I loved how Sonali Dev described writing this book in her acknowledgements section: “I would love to say that this book was hard labor, that my path to publication was riddled with sacrifice and tears. But I can’t. Writing Samir and Mili’s story was pure joy, and my path was so riddled with the incredible generosity and support of so many people…”
Amanda: I loved that too! Even though there was some sadness to this book i just loved it. It was a joy to read. 5 stars!!
Holly: I loved it too! Good find, pal.
Source: Thank Goodness for public libraries where we both found this one!
Gun In Act One 
Love this post! You two have me wanting to read this book where if I’d just glanced at the premise I’d have kept walking. Thanks for sharing!
Hope you love the book too!
Loved everything about this. Thank you!!
Hugs,
-Sonali
oh thank you for writing such a great book!
I soooooooo want to read this one. EVERYONE likes it
Ok, I was out of books and went through your old posts for a good suggestion and found this book. I just finished it and wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed it. Mili was just so different – and I absolutely loved her. The funny thing is, I had just seen about a million photos from a Punjabi wedding from a co-worker about a month before- so I had a full image in my mind of the colors and the ceremony that took place. This was a beautiful book. I am not a big romance reader – I am glad you didn’t describe it as such or I may not have bought it.