What Prince?

Indian Maidens Bust Loose - Vidya Samson

(Edit: The correct cover now shows since Booklikes added a book database. Yay!)

 

When I downloaded and read this it was titled Indian Maidens Bust Loose and had a completely different (and slightly horrible) cover. If I had seen this post-cover/title change I probably wouldn't have picked it up. I don't generally gravitate toward book covers featuring male torsos, clothed or otherwise. I'm thinking this new cover and title are kind of misleading, since the book is very much about Indian maidens and not so much about the search for Prince Charming. In fact, our protagonist, Nisha, and her sister spend most of their encounters with eligible bachelors trying every trick in the book to prevent a marriage from being arranged. The only man Nisha makes an effort to impress is the one who offers the best chance of getting her out of India. If I had come into this hoping for a straight-up romance I would have been disappointed, as a large part of the story focuses on cultural clashes with Nisha's privileged American cousins and the romance is almost an afterthought.

 

Luckily for me, I wasn't expecting a straight-up romance and therefor I wasn't disappointed. I have no idea how accurate this is in terms of depicting Indian culture. My gut says it's more satirical than accurate ... not that satire can't be accurate, but a lot of stuff, especially toward the end, just felt way over the top. Like the author was going for the cheap laugh when the natural, genuine laugh was right there and didn't have to be forced. This is why I didn't give this four stars. I found Nisha very easy to relate to and there were several laugh-out-loud moments. This was a fun, quick read and if the author writes more books like this I will give them a try.