A Bollywood Affair by Sonali Dev

Narrated by Priya Ayyar

I loved this highly original, culturally rich, exploration into the depths the human will is capable of stooping to when attempting to right a perceived wrong against a loved one. The most amazing thing, however, is that out of all this ugliness and seeming despair, comes a truly inspirational love story between two surprisingly selfless individuals who can’t help but rescue others, even practical strangers. This story ripped my heart into a million pieces and then put it all back together again. Without a doubt, A Bollywood Affair
is one of the most unique love stories I have ever had the pleasure of experiencing!

Imagine being married at the age of four to another child, and then for the next twenty years never having met your husband. While this would never happen in our world, Mili’s family hailed from a tiny Indian village where prearranged and child marriages happened all the time. All those years, she painstakingly prepared to be the ideal Indian wife. She even used what little means she had to maintain her husband’s ancestral home following his family’s abandonment, and move away from their village.

Despite her countless letters, he never came to visit her, not even once. So Mili used the strangely paradoxical freedom that her marriage had afforded her to undertake a last ditch effort to make herself a presentable wife for her big-city dwelling, military officer husband. She accepts a scholarship to come study in America in the hopes that he will finally accept her.

Spurred by his older brother’s near death experience, Samir “Sam” Rathod, a charismatic and wildly popular Bollywood director who writes the scripts for all his movies, comes to Michigan to fulfill his older brother’s hospital bedside wish. His mission is to attain an annulment for his brother.  This quest is time sensitive as his brother’s first child with his true love, the woman he married as an adult – and who he considers to be his real wife – is about to be born.

For a man who always gets what he wants, particularly when it comes to the fairer sex, persuading a naive village girl should be no feat at all. Moreover, after receiving notice that Mili has filed to be awarded his brother’s estate, Sam is convinced that he must defend his brother, particularly at a time when he can’t defend himself, against this apparent gold-digger’s malicious intentions.

But nothing is quite what it seems like at first glance. So imagine Sam’s surprise when the girl he finds in America neither fits the image of an ignorant, sheltered village girl, nor a selfish, self-entitled, wealth seeker. In fact, Sam quickly becomes enthralled by Mili’s complete opposite disposition. Sweet, caring and selfless, Mili is a woman with very little means, but willing to take the clothes off her back to help others. Also, she is a fascinating conundrum: a woman trying to blend her conservative Indian traditions with the reality that its ancient ways and interrelated independence has afforded her.

The facts just don’t add up, and Sam determines to stay in America for a while until he can figure out just what game is being played. The fact that Mili has an unfortunate accident, and clearly has no one to help her, also fuels Sam’s determination to withhold his true identity and use this time to clandestinely observe Mili’s true nature. Soon, however, Sam doesn’t just find himself playing caretaker to determine Mili’s true intentions, but he finds that he actually really enjoys her company, so much so, that she becomes his muse, and inspires him to write after a long bout with writer’s block.

Mili, too, for the first time, starts experiencing feelings for someone other than her estranged husband and struggles deeply with the guilt. When there is no longer any way to deny that their true feelings go beyond the bounds of friendship, what direction will their relationship take? Will Mili ever be able to accept Sam when she finds out who he really is and his original motivations?

Priya Ayyar appears to be a relatively new narrator with only four titles listed on Audible. Her performance was for the most part well done in that she adeptly switched back and forth between a heavily Indian accented English for Sam and Mili and non-accented English for the general narrative and enactment of the American raised characters.  She also believably brought to life the numerous emotion-filled scenes that make this audiobook so special.

Perhaps my favorite part of her performance was her depiction of Mili. Mili’s voice bore just the right balance of sweetness, innocence, and self-determination. You could hear her angst as she so clearly struggled between the old traditions she was raised with and the reality of the new world that she finds herself in. Had this book been written completely in the first person from Mili’s perspective, Ms. Ayyar would have delivered a nearly flawless rendition.

Unfortunately, however, I found myself at times struggling with Ms. Ayyar’s depiction of the other characters. In that regard, I will note that Sam sounded feminine in nature at times. Moreover, I found very little differentiation among the Indian accented roles of the same gender. In that regard, I could distinguish Sam from Mili most of the times (although at times I struggled a bit there too and had to rely on dialogue tags). Identifying Mili from her female roommate, and Sam from his brother when the two were speaking together, I found to be much more difficult. There really was very little variance in the intonation to allow you to pick out one character from the other. Given the well-rounded nature of the rest of the performance, I imagine the ability to more highly differentiate characters will come in time, and therefore I would definitely be willing to listen to Ms. Ayyar again in the future.

All in all, this story was so much more than what I was expecting. When I signed on to review this title, I definitely was looking for something different. What I found, however, was so much more! This story left me with the very satisfying feeling that there is no denying true love, even when the odds seem overwhelmingly not in your favor. If you are looking for a highly original, sweet, feel good romance, then I can’t recommend A Bollywood Affair highly enough!

BJ

Narration:  C+

Book Content:  A+

Steam Factor:  For your burning ears only (although tame in the passion department, this rating is determined by the descriptive words used in its only love scene)

Violence:  Domestic violence

Genre:  Contemporary Romance

Publisher:  Blackstone Audio

A Bollywood Affair was provided to AudioGals by Blackstone Audio for review.