Title : It All Comes Back to You
Author : Farah Naz Rishi
Genre : Young Adult ; Contemporary Fiction ; Cultural Fiction ; Asian Literature ;
Pages : 432
Narrators : Vikas Adam ; Ariana Delawari
BLURB
After Kiran Noorani‘s mom died, Kiran vowed to keep her dad and sister, Amira, close. Then out of the blue, Amira announces that she’s dating someone and might move cross-country with him. Kiran is thrown.
Deen Malik is thrilled that his older brother, Faisal, has found a great girlfriend, even if it’s getting serious quickly. Maybe now their parents’ focus will shift off Deen, who feels intense pressure to be the perfect son.
When Deen and Kiran come face to face, they silently agree to keep their past a secret. Four years ago–before Amira and Faisal met–Kiran and Deen dated. But Deen ghosted Kiran with no explanation. Kiran will stop at nothing to find out what happened, and Deen will do anything, even if it means sabotaging his brother’s relationship, to keep her from reaching the truth. Though the chemistry between Kiran and Deen is undeniable, can either of them take down their walls?
REVIEW
It All Comes Back to You is a Young Adult fiction by a young Pakistani-American Author Farah Naz Rishi. It All Comes Back to You revolves around two sets of siblings: Kiran Noorani – Amira Noorani and Deen Malik – Faisal Malik.
The plotline of this book is based in the US and it is about two Muslim Pakistani-American families. Kiran‘s sister Amira finds her true love in Faisal and decides to marry him despite meeting him only a few months ago. This piece of information shatters the overprotective Kiran to bits and pieces as she wasn’t mentally prepared to let go of her sister to another man’s house. Her possessiveness over her sister naturally creates an aversion towards Faisal. To make things, even more, worse, Kiran finds out Faisal is hiding something and also he is her ex-boyfriend, Deen’s brother. Deen and Kiran dated years ago and their relationship strained as Deen ghosted her out of the blue. This bad track record of Deen in Kiran‘s eyes makes her distrust towards Faisal heighten even more.
In order to protect her sister from a plausibly bad groom, she decided to adorn the hat of a detective and starts digging around about Faisal and the Maliks. Deen who is well aware of Kiran‘s motive to stop the wedding, take up the responsibility to save his brother’s secret and wedding with all his life.
Who succeeded in the end? Kiran or Deen? Or did they fall in love all over again because of their undeniable chemistry? That’s the story of this book.
First of all, the writing style of Farah Naz Rishi was so refreshing and young. The way her writing moved the plot ahead was commendable. It was so good to read her youthful narrative. The book was written from multiple perspectives and she has magnificently done that. Sometimes multiple perspectives can be confusing or worse – boring but Farah has mastered it smoothly. The voices were also different, the readers can distinctly understand who is narrating what in a jiffy.
The plotline of the book was extremely funny and relatable. Every time Kiran does something funny to stop the wedding was the best. At some level, you can relate to her and her craziness despite knowing what she’s doing is wrong. Kiran‘s friendship with Asher was something that will make anyone smile. The way Asher always have Kiran’s back was simply adorable. What was more beautiful was him pointing out her mistakes at the right place and at the right time even though she hardly listens to him. Asher is the kind of friend everyone needs in life.
Kiran‘s backstory, her relationship with her parents, especially her mother was beautifully written. Kiran‘s way of grieving over her mother and everything about her family helped bring about a remarkable character arc to Kiran. Her father’s character was also beautifully penned.
The character arc of Deen was amazing. His love for his brother and trying to handle everything on his own without bothering Faisal was impressive. The brotherhood shared between these two brothers were ultimate goals. Deen‘s character was super mature and a complete contrast to Kiran’s. Amira and Faisal‘s presence accessorized the book for good. Amira was super sweet and very Jane-like personality from Pride and Prejudice. Faisal on the other hand was a silent and reserved guy who was bullied by his parents all his life. In spite of his questionable behaviour and the secrecy he maintains, the readers will root for him.
The best thing about this book was the way in which the author has written the cultural aspects of the plot. How things happen in a Pakistani Muslim household, the engagement, wedding preps, wedding dance, the kind of food and sweets prepared. All these things made the book more authentic and ethnic.
The author not just focuses on the lead character’s relationship but at the same time, she also focused on their college life as well. Especially Deen‘s life at NYU was good to read. The author also spoke about Kiran‘s dance interest in Indian Classical Dance and other personal aspects of the leads. These highlighted the book even better and gave more life to the characters and books.
Throughout the book, the lead characters play this interesting computer game called Cambria. The way in which the author has blended this game along with the storyline was interesting and unique.
MY VIEWS
It is always a bliss to find South Asian names on the cover of mainstream novels. The first thing that attracted me to this book was the cover and the name on this book. The attires worn by the characters on the cover of the book hyped me up. I read the blurb and I understood it was brown people’s story based in the US and like an added advantage I realised it was a Muslim story. Wow! And it had one of my favourite romance tropes “Exes brought together by fate” What else do I need? And thankfully this book didn’t let me down.
It All Comes Back to You is the first audiobook I listened to on Storytel and in that way, it will hold a special place in my heart. The narrators of this book did a wonderful job. I was so in love with their narration. The quality of the audiobook raised the quality of the book itself on the whole.
The desi references, let it be references to Bollywood music, Indian classical dance, Gulab Jamun, Biryani, kabobs, curries all of these things made the book so relatable. To be honest, it felt so refreshing to read about Biryani in a US-based book instead of bacon and bagels. I particularly liked the references about visits to the mosque, the Sunday school, premarital counselling with the Imam and the importance of it. I learned a lot of things.
I personally liked Faisal, he seemed to be really nice brother-in-law material and the way he tries to get along with Kiran and getting excited whenever she wants to give him a chance. That was really nice to read. I wanted to shake Kiran and ask her to leave Amira and Faisal alone. But at the same time, I totally understood Kiran’s behaviour, probably I would have done the same thing if I were in her shoes.
On the whole, this Muslim Pakistani-American story made me so happy and it was fulfilling. I felt like was reading a plotline that was very near to me, as if a storyline from my locality despite that not being the case. I completely enjoyed this book and looking forward to reading more of Farah Naz Rishi’s works in the future.
My rating for this book would be 4 out of 5 stars
I would like to recommend this book to Young Adult lovers, you are looking forward to reading a desi read which feels closer to your roots, this book will satisfy you. If you want to read a South Asian book, then you can definitely go for it.
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Happy Reading Folks!
~ Meenu
