A Holly Jolly Diwali — Books, Beauty, & Buys

By: Sonya Lalli
Published Year: 2021
Publisher: Berkley
Pages: 336

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Twenty-nine-year-old Niki Randhawa has always made practical decisions. Despite her love for music and art, she became an analyst for the stability. She's always stuck close to home, in case her family needed her. And she's always dated guys that seem good on paper, rather than the ones who give her butterflies. When she's laid off, Niki realizes that practical hasn't exactly paid off for her. So for the first time ever, she throws caution to the wind and books a last-minute flight for her friend Diya's wedding.

Niki arrives in India just in time to celebrate Diwali, the festival of lights, where she meets London musician Sameer Mukherji. Maybe it's the splendor of Mumbai or the magic of the holiday season, but Niki is immediately drawn to Sam. At the wedding, the champagne flows and their flirtatious banter makes it clear that the attraction is mutual.

When Niki and Sam join Diya, her husband and their friends on a group honeymoon, their connection grows deeper. Free-spirited Sam helps Niki get in touch with her passionate and creative side, and with her Indian roots. When she gets a new job offer back home, Niki must decide what she wants out of the next chapter of her life--to cling to the straight and narrow like always, or to take a leap of faith and live the kind of bold life the old Niki never would have dreamed of.

First Impression

The title is what got me on this book. The cover is cute and fun and festive which didn’t hurt. I also had been hearing a lot about Diwali right when this book came out which felt like I was destined to read it. I’ve also read two of Lalli’s previous novels and enjoyed both of them so I knew this would be a solid pick.

What I thought

I really enjoyed the first half of this book, and I was ok with the ending, but the middle portion (or maybe the 3rd quarter?) was where I had a little issue.

When Niki gets let go from her job, she decides to jump on a plane to India to attend her best friend’s wedding. While there, she meets Sam who she immediately falls for. But he lives in London and she’s in Seattle. Will this just be a holiday romance? Or will it be able to blossom into something more?

For the first part of this book I really liked Niki. I felt she was a strong character who, while having doubts about her identity (always wondering if she’s Indian enough) she never came across as weak to me. Then in the second half of the book I feel like she was a completely different character. I got very annoyed with the conflict. I know that every romance story has to have a conflict, but I wasn’t crazy about this one. Maybe it was also because the love story played out so quickly?

The rest of the characters I liked the entirety of the book. I liked Sam and his chemistry with Niki. I really loved Niki’s parents. And I also liked Niki’s friends. Her sister I was a bit iffy about, but that’s how it’s supposed to be so I’m ok with that.

I did enjoy the was that Indian culture was written about in this story. I feel like I learned a lot about Diwali as well as some of the classism that exists. It was interesting seeing Niki struggle with being Indian in America vs being Indian in India.

While I got a little annoyed with the journey, I appreciated the ending. It felt realistic and I liked that everything wasn’t fixed with a magical snap of the fingers.