Meet Me in Mumbai

Sometimes, I wonder why I decide to pick up genres like YA contemporary when I know I'm too old for them. But this was another book where the premise hooked me and I couldn't resist the opportunity to participate in a blog tour. And I'm glad I did.

I was actually expecting the two timelines to alternate but I think the author's decision to tell the whole story from the past first and then move on to the present worked fine for this story. It was a very easy to read in terms of pacing and I finished it in one shot but that doesn't mean the content was easy to take in. As the author is dealing with themes like teenage pregnancy, interracial adoption, identity crisis and more - there's a lot of pain and anguish in these pages which the author captures well and I felt the importance and gravity of the decisions that the characters were having to make. While I don't really identify with any of the themes, it was still a very relatable book because of how innately South Asian everything felt.

Both the characters Ayesha and Mira did and felt things which I thought they were being wrong about but upon trying not to judge them, I realized they were only being eighteen year olds thrust into difficult situations and dealing with them in whatever way they could think of. Ayesha in particular is terrified and alone and the fact that she even manages to make such momentous decisions is highly commendable. It was only her tremendous guilt I had some issue with but I also decide how she should feel about giving up her daughter.

Mira on the other hand has had a wonderful childhood and family but the feeling of missing something never goes away. Her sadness at not knowing much about her own birth heritage felt very sad and her attempts at finding those missing parts of herself was heartening. I was also very glad that she had such an excellent support system in her parents and friends. Actually, the one thing that I noticed about the whole book was that there were only supportive characters throughout and despite the sad content, it's overall a very positive book.

On the whole, this was something unlike most books I read but I thought it was a very well written tale of two young women separated by circumstances finally finding their way back to each. It's about love and family of all kinds, the one we are born in and the one we make, and how being supportive of each other can only lead to happiness even if things aren't going well. The final page made me tear up and it was such a poignant way to end the story, where it feels like a new beginning. This was my first book by the author but I definitely hope it won't be my last.