Author: Sandhya Menon

Review Round Up | Of Princes & Promises and Reckless Girls

Posted February 25, 2022 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments

In an effort to cut down on posts and burnout, my Review Roundups will feature 2-4 books I’ve read or listened to recently. Sometimes they’re newer releases and sometimes they’re all backlist titles. My ARC reviews usually get the solo treatment. Enjoy the mini reviews! This series continues to baffle me a little bit. I enjoyed this book a similar amount to the first one. I was really hoping it was the characters from book one that prevented me from loving it but that turned out to not be the case here. If I were to read this without knowing Sandhya Menon wrote it, I’d be shocked to learn that she did. It just does not have the same feel as her other books, like the Dimple/Rishi universe. I think it’s mostly because she writes the characters as posh boarding school kids and her writing style feels weird as a result, like she’s trying hard to be fancy or something? In any case, this story followed Catarina and Rahul. She’s the pretty rich girl who rules the school and Rahul is the socially awkward kid whose family doesn’t even include him in public photos (his cousin stands in). The two of them had a ~moment~ after the school dance and Rahul is dying to capitalize on this. Catarina starts to “train him” to be a prince instead of a frog; she wants to make her cheater-ex-boyfriend jealous at some important events with a transformed Rahul on her arm. They acquire a magical […]

ARC Reviews: Sunshine on Silver Lake and 10 Things I Hate About Pinky

Posted August 24, 2020 / Book Reviews / 1 Comment

I’m always so thrilled to come home to Sweetwater Springs! This series has catapulted its way into my favorites list and continues to cement that spot with each new book. This is one of the best ones too, IMO! I loved that this was both fake dating AND (kinda) second chance romance AND childhood-friends-to-more. All of my tropes rolled into one in a way that made sense! Emma and Jack were close friends (almost more) in their younger years, until Jack blew her off for her senior prom. They did reconcile and remained friends throughout their adult lives living in Sweetwater Springs, but neither one of them would take the plunge into something more. When Jack suddenly has his nephew in his care for the summer, it’s easy for him to pretend (for his sister’s sake) that Emma is his girlfriend. Naturally, things progress into more. Emma is currently struggling with turning 30 and the bad feelings it provides about her mother’s untimely passing and battle with cancer. I REALLY enjoyed both of these characters and thought their friends-to-more relationship developed incredibly naturally. As always, there wasn’t any minor drama to split the couple up and I was never frustrated by miscommunication. Rains generally does a great job of giving the characters actual problems that need to be worked through to cause the “breakup” moment in the book. This one was short-lived too. Sweetwater Springs continues to be a fun, cute setting, and I love that we keep getting introduced […]

ARC Review: Of Curses and Kisses

Posted February 6, 2020 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

I am a member of Sandhya’s Street Team because I support her and love her books. However, this book was provided by the author in exchange for an honest review. When I first saw the announcement for this book and series, I was straight-up over the moon. It immediately became one of my top most anticipated reads. When I was accepted to join Sandhya’s street team and was given an egalley of this book, I was even MORE excited. I dove into it pretty quickly. Unfortunately I didn’t FINISH it just as quickly, but I’ll get into that later. As you can see from this post, I was so effing excited: Like… excuse my French but are you fucking kidding me? I need this series more than I need the air I breathe. Everything about this is perfect and has me written all over it. The author, the boarding school setting, the fairytale retellings, the possible fake dating/hate-to-love trope… Good lord. I’ve been turning a corner on Royal-related books lately and this one will 100% be perfect for me. I just know it. I was in a bit of a slump in September 2019 when I started reading this (woof) and unfortunately that hindered my interest in it. I put it aside for maybe a week or two after starting because I had a few other required reads to sneak in between. When I picked it back up in October, I wasn’t quite as excited to keep reading. The premise […]

ARC Review: Hungry Hearts

Posted May 24, 2019 / Book Reviews / 2 Comments

I was so excited for this anthology because I’m a huge fan of food (of all types) and short story collections in general! I love even MORE when the stories are connected. In this case, all of these occur on Hungry Hearts Row, a place where “magic and food and love are sometimes one and the same.” As usual, I’ll be sharing mini reviews and ratings for each story, plus overall feelings and an average rating for the whole anthology. Rain by Sangu Mandanna I’m glad that the first story introduced the setting of Hungry Hearts Row, because I was curious about how they would set that scene if someone didn’t read the synopsis. The main character comes in from England and talks about the Indian food from her mother’s home. She’s grieving her mother and struggling to keep a connectiong with her father throughout the story, so it was a bit melancholy. I loved how she connected her mother with food (specifically her favorite dish). Such a cute and simple story about family, loss, and food… and how all three connect to keep someone’s memory alive. Kings and Queens by Elsie Chapman I loved the exploration Chinese food here, especially because it has become so Westernized in American Chinese restaurants. (I also loved that the first connections between the stories starting already, because this family’s restaurant was referenced in the first story and there were a few characters I assume will come around later.) It took a turn I […]

Review Round Up | Fumbled, The Manic Pixie Dream Boy Improvement Project, and There’s Something About Sweetie

Posted May 6, 2019 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments

In an effort to cut down on posts and burnout, my Review Roundups will feature 2-4 books I’ve read or listened to recently. Sometimes they’re newer releases and sometimes they’re all backlist titles. My ARC reviews usually get the solo treatment. Enjoy the mini reviews! I really enjoyed INTERCEPTED, despite the incessant internal hashtagging that the main character did. There were some parts I didn’t love about that book though, so I was slightly concerned but optimistic about FUMBLED. I really had nothing to worry about though, because this book was even better than the first! I loved TK when he made appearances in the first book so I was super excited to see that this starred him, in a second chance romance. Poppy and TK were together in high school… and TK has no idea that her nine-year old son is his. When they cross paths again at a club where Poppy works, sparks fly and she knows the truth will have to come out. I appreciated that this piece of drama was not dragged out; the honest moment happened early on instead of way-too-late like it would in most books. TK and Poppy had reasonable arguments, discussions, and conversations about everything. I loved their openness. There were actually quite a few moments where I expected there to be friction between them (about money, parenting style, etc.) that were handled perfect well and logically. It was genuinely refreshing to read in a romance novel where one person is a celebrity/athlete and […]

ARC Reviews: From Twinkle with Love, Dating Disasters of Emma Nash, and The Last Summer of the Garrett Girls

Posted June 4, 2018 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

Can you tell that my plan to get ahead on May ARCs didn’t exactly work? I did read all of these books IN May, but didn’t give myself enough calendar space to share my reviews in a timely manner. Two of these published last month and one of them publishes tomorrow! This was adorable! I loved DIMPLE and was extremely excited to read Menon’s sophomore novel as a result. Her formula of geeky smart girls plus cinnamon roll boys is a winning combination for me so far. I noticed some mixed early reviews so I was a bit nervous that Twinkle, as a character, would be frustrating for me to read. I like YA books where the characters are flawed and kind of learn / grow up throughout the novel, but I’m always hoping that it stays relatable. I can see why it’s polarizing because Twinkle definitely makes some rough and immature decisions throughout the book. She’s used to being a wallflower and is feeling hurt that her best friend, Maddie, has moved into the ~popular girls~ group at their school, leaving Twinkle for just some scraps of her time. She has an overwhelming crush on Neil while balancing a friendship with his twin, Sahil. The two of them are working on a gender-swapped Dracula film together and very obviously falling for each other. Add in a mysterious secret admirer named “N” via email, and Twinkle is quite confused. There are so many moments in this book where I questioned Dimple but […]

ARC Review: When Dimple Met Rishi

Posted May 18, 2017 / Book Reviews / 14 Comments

Initial Excitement I was excited for this book for so many reasons. I saw it a long time ago when it was added to Goodreads and discussed it with my friend Natasha, who is Indian and always reads books about white people. She was so excited to hear about the premise and added it to her non-book-blogger-TBR-in-her-head. When Nick offered it up for me to borrow, I jumped on it immediately. Quick Summary WHEN DIMPLE MET RISHI is set up to bring together classic rom-coms like When Harry Met Sally and some classic Bollywood movies and plot points. I’ve seen a good amount of these movies (Bollywood and US-based rom-coms) and have to say it was a great combination. Dimple’s family is pressuring her to wear makeup, find a serious Indian boyfriend, etc. and she is not a fan of the idea. Rishi’s family is doing the same thing, but his attitude is very different from hers. The two meet at a summer coding camp called Insomnia Con. Little does Dimple know, Rishi is there because their parents are all pushing for an arranged marriage. This sets off a funny chain of events where Rishi comes on too strong… and the relationship grows from there <3 Storytelling, Setting, and Feels Plot: I adored the premise for this story. Dimple and Rishi head to a coding summer camp-type of thing and end up working together on the project. The setting and competition of who can develop the best app was a lot of fun […]