My So Called Bollywood Life by Nisha Sharma – ARC Review

Thank you to Stripes Books for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Guys, I loved this book so much and no-one is more surprised than me because cutesy contemporary books are so not my type of books. But that will also tell you how amazing this book is because I absolutely adored it!

Rating: 5/5

Synopsis from Goodreads:

Winnie Mehta was never really convinced that Raj was her soulmate, but their love was written in the stars. Literally, a pandit predicted Winnie would find the love of her life before her 18th birthday, and Raj meets all of the qualifications. Which is why Winnie is shocked to return from her summer at film camp to find her boyfriend of three years hooking up with Jenny Dickens. Worse, Raj is crowned chair of the student film festival, a spot Winnie was counting on for her film school applications. As a self-proclaimed Bollywood expert, Winnie knows this is not how her perfect ending is scripted.

Then there’s Dev, a fellow film geek, and one of the few people Winnie can count on to help her reclaim control of her story. Dev is smart, charming, and challenges Winnie to look beyond her horoscope to find someone she’d pick for herself. But does falling for Dev mean giving up on her prophecy, and her chance to live happily ever after? To get her Bollywood-like life on track, Winnie will need a little bit of help from fate, family, and of course, a Bollywood movie star.

Like an expertly choreographed Bollywood dance scene, Nisha Sharma’s off-beat love story dazzles in the lime light.

This book was so much fun to read and I was rooting for Dev and Winnie right from the beginning! They are so adorable, I just cannot deal! As I said, I don’t usually read these types of books because I don’t particularly enjoy them, but I realised that it’s actually because I can’t relate to them. This book, I could totally relate to! From the characters and family dynamics and how the desi community is.

“As much as I love Bollywood damsels in distress, I don’t need saving. I’m my own hero.”

Winnie is such a fun character even when she can be a bit over the top melodramatic, I mean it totally fits Bollywood films though! She is confident and passionate and driven. She fights for what she wants to achieve in life and won’t let anyone stop her. I loved seeing how much she loved Bollywood films to the point that she would reference them in relation to her own life situations. She always believed in the astrology reading that her families pandit told them when she was young but after her break up with Raj, she stops believing and decides to live by her own rules.

It was interesting to see how she lived combining both her Indian culture and living in America. I rarely see so much desi culture ingrained into the story so I loved seeing that! From the Hindi words, to the clothes, food, family dynamics and religious beliefs and practices. I loved that she felt comfortable with combining them both, because I could relate.

Dev is an actual cinnamon roll, he is sweet and caring and thoughtful. He stands up for Winnie when Raj harasses her. He believes in her and that she can achieve her dreams and honestly, I just absolutely adored him! It was so nice to see him be vulnerable in front of Winnie, from his fear of heights to opening up about his past.

This book is full of Bollywood references from Winnie’s dreams featuring Shah Rukh Khan and him saying some of his most famous dialogues to a surprise dance number which was total Bollywood style, where the hero shows how much he loves the heroine. I was grinning like an idiot the whole scene.

One of the other things I loved was the female friendship between Winnie and Bridget, how they were always there for each other and supported each other. I really loved that when they did have a disagreement they worked it out without it being so over dramatic and both acknowledging their mistake. I also loved how Winnie’s nani and mum were there for Winnie, even if they didn’t always agree on things or see eye to eye.

This book is so much fun and I absolutely loved reading it. It’s a book that once you start you won’t be able to put down because you will be swept up in the story!

PS. This is the first book where my name was in a book! It was just a character mentioned once but it was still there and I literally had to stop and squeal!