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Love Marriage: A Novel
Named a Best Book of 2022 So Far by The New Yorker!
“Cultural clashes, political satire, Oedipal conflicts, elegant prose—they’re all here in this romp of a book.” —Oprah Daily
A Phenomenal Book Club Pick and a New York Times Book Review Group Text Selection, Love Marriage is a glorious moving novel from Booker Prize shortlisted Monica Ali, who has “an inborn generosity that cannot be learned” (The New York Times Book Review).
In present-day London, Yasmin Ghorami is twenty-six, in training to be a doctor (like her Indian-born father), and engaged to the charismatic, upper-class Joe Sangster, whose formidable mother, Harriet, is a famous feminist. The gulf between families is vast. So, too, is the gulf in sexual experience between Yasmin and Joe.
As the wedding day draws near, misunderstandings, infidelities, and long-held secrets upend both Yasmin’s relationship and that of her parents, a “love marriage,” according to the family lore that Yasmin has believed all her life.
A gloriously acute observer of class, sexual mores, and the mysteries of the human heart, Monica Ali has written a “riveting” (BookPage, starred review) social comedy and a moving, revelatory story of two cultures, two families, and two people trying to understand one another that’s “sure to please Ali’s fans and win some new ones” (Publishers Weekly).
“Cultural clashes, political satire, Oedipal conflicts, elegant prose—they’re all here in this romp of a book.” —Oprah Daily
A Phenomenal Book Club Pick and a New York Times Book Review Group Text Selection, Love Marriage is a glorious moving novel from Booker Prize shortlisted Monica Ali, who has “an inborn generosity that cannot be learned” (The New York Times Book Review).
In present-day London, Yasmin Ghorami is twenty-six, in training to be a doctor (like her Indian-born father), and engaged to the charismatic, upper-class Joe Sangster, whose formidable mother, Harriet, is a famous feminist. The gulf between families is vast. So, too, is the gulf in sexual experience between Yasmin and Joe.
As the wedding day draws near, misunderstandings, infidelities, and long-held secrets upend both Yasmin’s relationship and that of her parents, a “love marriage,” according to the family lore that Yasmin has believed all her life.
A gloriously acute observer of class, sexual mores, and the mysteries of the human heart, Monica Ali has written a “riveting” (BookPage, starred review) social comedy and a moving, revelatory story of two cultures, two families, and two people trying to understand one another that’s “sure to please Ali’s fans and win some new ones” (Publishers Weekly).
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Community Reviews
This was an interesting read...it took me a very long time to finish it (almost a month).
Normally, I'd give a book either 3-5 chapters or 100 pages. The chapters in this book are about 10 pages or less as each is used to shift perspectives (to a degree, Yasmin is still the main storyteller for 95% of the book), so it was a bit hard to gauge early on if I wanted to keep reading. There was just something about Yasmin as a character that I couldn't quite draw my attention toward, as if she were some trope I'd read about before so I could kind of see where the story was headed.
However, the introduction of Sandor and that whole element of the plot about 1/3 of the way through the book is what started to get my attention. I really enjoyed his chapters as we got to learn more about the Sangster family that way.
Main character wise, I think another reason why it took me so long to read was because I wasn't drawn to any character. Harriet was EXTREMELY annoying (though I get the trope she's playing and given the Sandor plotline makes sense), there wasn't much about Joe until the Sandor plotline, and the Ghoramis themselves were very...predictable in certain aspects. I get the big reveal at the end, sure, but I still think how they went about the world was a bit predictable. I actually enjoyed the secondary characters more - Rania, Ms. Antonoff, Pepperdine, Sandor - and wish more attention had been given to them.
But yeah, overall an interesting read but not one of my favorites for the year.
Normally, I'd give a book either 3-5 chapters or 100 pages. The chapters in this book are about 10 pages or less as each is used to shift perspectives (to a degree, Yasmin is still the main storyteller for 95% of the book), so it was a bit hard to gauge early on if I wanted to keep reading. There was just something about Yasmin as a character that I couldn't quite draw my attention toward, as if she were some trope I'd read about before so I could kind of see where the story was headed.
However, the introduction of Sandor and that whole element of the plot about 1/3 of the way through the book is what started to get my attention. I really enjoyed his chapters as we got to learn more about the Sangster family that way.
Main character wise, I think another reason why it took me so long to read was because I wasn't drawn to any character. Harriet was EXTREMELY annoying (though I get the trope she's playing and given the Sandor plotline makes sense), there wasn't much about Joe until the Sandor plotline, and the Ghoramis themselves were very...predictable in certain aspects. I get the big reveal at the end, sure, but I still think how they went about the world was a bit predictable. I actually enjoyed the secondary characters more - Rania, Ms. Antonoff, Pepperdine, Sandor - and wish more attention had been given to them.
But yeah, overall an interesting read but not one of my favorites for the year.
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