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 heavy read about the harsh realities of tragedy and their effects on those left behind.
In this companion novel to 2013’s If He Had Been With Me, three characters tell their sides of the story.
Finn’s narrative starts three days before his death. He explores the progress of his unrequited love for best friend Autumn up until the day he finally expresses his feelings. Finn’s story ends with his tragic death, which leaves his close friends devastated, unmoored, and uncertain how to go on. Jack’s section follows, offering a heartbreaking look at what it’s like to live with grief. Jack works to overcome the anger he feels toward Sylvie, the girlfriend Finn was breaking up with when he died, and Autumn, the girl he was preparing to build his life around (but whom Jack believed wasn’t good enough for Finn). But when Jack sees how Autumn’s grief matches his own, it changes their understanding of one another. Autumn’s chapters trace her life without Finn as readers follow her struggles with mental health and balancing love and loss. Those who have read the earlier book will better connect with and feel for these characters, particularly since they’ll have a more well-rounded impression of Finn. The pain and anger is well written, and the novel highlights the most troublesome aspects of young adulthood: overconfidence sprinkled with heavy insecurities, fear-fueled decisions, bad communication, and brash judgments. Characters are cued white.
A heavy read about the harsh realities of tragedy and their effects on those left behind. (author’s note, content warning) (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781728276229
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
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