A perceptive and textured romance.
Seventeen-year-old Radha Chopra has always loved kathak, a classical dance form from North India.
Because of her dedication and hard work, Indian American Radha is world famous—and burned out. She no longer knows if she’s dancing for joy or for her mother, Sujata Roy Chopra, who pressures Radha to excel so that she doesn’t experience the same regret she feels for leaving her own acclaimed dance career behind two decades before. When Radha refuses to compete in the finals at an international championship in London, her mother is furious. Although Radha is sure that her kathak career is over, she makes a deal with her mother: She will leave Chicago to spend her senior year at an arts academy in Princeton, New Jersey. If Radha works hard and gives dancing one more shot, Sujata promises that she can make her own decisions at the end of the year. Radha is sure that she will give up dance until she meets Jai Patel, a working-class Punjabi Gujarati American boy who is the captain of the school’s Bollywood dance team. Radha quickly falls for Jai—but is their romance enough to make her also fall for dancing all over again? This entertaining novel alternates between Jai’s and Radha’s third-person perspectives. Changes in their relationship, and between each of them and their immigrant families, are well paced, authentic, and page-turning. Both characters are well developed and easy to root for.
A perceptive and textured romance. (Romance. 14-18)Pub Date: July 13, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-553-52329-4
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 10, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2021
PERSPECTIVES
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head.
The finely drawn characters capture readers’ attention in this debut.
Autumn and Phineas, nicknamed Finny, were born a week apart; their mothers are still best friends. Growing up, Autumn and Finny were like peas in a pod despite their differences: Autumn is “quirky and odd,” while Finny is “sweet and shy and everyone like[s] him.” But in eighth grade, Autumn and Finny stop being friends due to an unexpected kiss. They drift apart and find new friends, but their friendship keeps asserting itself at parties, shared holiday gatherings and random encounters. In the summer after graduation, Autumn and Finny reconnect and are finally ready to be more than friends. But on August 8, everything changes, and Autumn has to rely on all her strength to move on. Autumn’s coming-of-age is sensitively chronicled, with a wide range of experiences and events shaping her character. Even secondary characters are well-rounded, with their own histories and motivations.
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head. (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: April 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4022-7782-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A worthy second-chance romance.
In this follow-up to 2021’s Better Than the Movies, a 20-year-old college freshman gets a second chance at his dreams.
After the death of his father and his mother’s subsequent physical and emotional disappearance, Wes Bennett left behind all of his plans and the girl he made them with to go home and take care of Sarah, his younger sister. But now, Sarah has graduated, his mom is back on her feet, and by some miracle, Wes has an offer to pitch for UCLA’s baseball team. Liz Buxbaum, the girl he’s always loved, works for the university’s athletic department, taking photos and video of the team for social media, which means that maybe he can have a second chance at love, too. But since Wes left, Liz has made every effort to protect herself from ever feeling that broken again; there’s no room for love, because she doesn’t believe in it anymore. Or she doesn’t want to. This second-chance sports romance includes fake dates, quippy and quirky best friends, real heartache, and the sweet ache of first love. The clever dialogue keeps readers from drowning in the main characters’ emotional push-and-pull. Reading the first novel isn’t necessary for appreciating this one, although knowing the full history between Wes and Liz will only add to the ache and longing readers feel from and for them. Main characters are cued white.
A worthy second-chance romance. (Romance. 14-18)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2024
ISBN: 9781665947138
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2024
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