3 out of 4 stars
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Hitched for Life is a short novel written by Anchal Rana Aggarwal. Aggarwal It focuses on the life of Alisha, a modern Indian woman. She and her friends, Maria, Ishika, and Nisha each go through issues concerning marriage.
After Alisha marries the love of her life, she must deal with the overbearing and nosy nature of her sisters-in-law, a mother-in-law who is never pleased with her, and an unfortunate family secret that threatens to ruin everything for those involved. Nisha must deal with a much more overbearing sister-in-law and a non-reactive husband. Maria may not be able to marry her fiancé because his parents oppose her altogether. Seeing her friends’ love lives, Ishika questions whether her future marriage will be as she dreamed it could be.
The theme of modern mindset clashing against the traditional mindset occurs throughout the novel. Alisha is very modern and strong-willed when compared to her friends and the other women of the story. Her in-laws are somewhat traditional when compared to Nisha’s overbearing in-laws, who oppose Western clothing over traditional Indian attire at one point in the book. Alisha, Nisha, Ishika, and Maria are all college-educated, and this education bolsters their desire to be equal in their relationships to their fiances and husbands. This theme is crucial to the book, because
Another major theme that I noticed in the novel was the daughter-in-law never being good enough for the in-laws. This theme appealed to me the most because it appears to be pivotal in understanding the mindset of the culture of the setting.
There were many elements of the book that I appreciated. First, I was able to glean from the context that the time period was set post-2004 because there were nuanced mentions of Facebook and text messages. The simple sentence structure of every sentence was a nice break from larger and untranslated novels, making Hitched for Life an easy short novel to read. All of the plot points, from exposition to resolution, were distinguishable. The conflicts that arise are portrayed well.
I give this book a rating of 3 out of 4. I enjoyed the peek into another culture that I gained form this novel. I had to re-read the novel to highlight the elements that I found dull, and this was difficult to do. One major negative element was the fact that the novel did not focus much attention on the development of Ishika and Maria. They seemed more like background characters than Alisha’s close friends. There was also a mix-up in names and some grammatical errors. These errors, along with the scrambled together happy ending are the reasons why I don’t give this book a rating of 4 out of 4.
The general scope of this novel may vary. I recommend it to college-age women over the age of 20 because it appeals to the ideals of marriage that modern women often seek out. I also recommend it to those who are interested in learning about post-2000s Indian culture.
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Hitched for life
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