Just kind of wasn’t feeling this one. I don’t really know why, but it was a little hard to connect to, and I didn’t really get into it.

What starts as seemingly light reading featuring New York family and friends headed to an Indian wedding morphs into a spectacularly entertaining examination of race, privilege, hybrid identity, family dysfunction, and maybe even a love story or five. Living in Mumbai and New York City, Diksha Basu, who used her home city of Delhi to immense success in her 2017 debut, The Windfall, returns with the dazzling Destination Wedding ...

Full review posted on Shelf Awareness Pro: https://www.shelf-awareness.com/issue.html?issue=3748#m48604 .

Review also cross-posted to Smithsonian BookDragon: http://smithsonianapa.org/bookdragon/destination-wedding-by-diksha-basu-in-shelf-awareness/

Tina Das grew up in Ohio, but never felt quite like she belonged in America. She visited India in the summers
with her parents, but doesn't quite belong there, either. She's facing a crisis of identity when she visits Delhi for her cousin's weeklong wedding. With Tina are her best friend Marianne, her mom Radha, her mom's boyfriend David Smith, and her father Neel.

For me, it was slow getting into this book. I wasn't sure I would finish it but I felt like wanted to see it through and I'm glad I did. I thought the author did a great job switching POV from character to character. It can be difficult as a reader to follow the switch in POV when it happens within a chapter but I thought Basu did it organically. I'm glad the characters got HEAs, and I appreciate that there was some uncertainty: no one was riding off into the sunset, there are always going to be more obstacles, but each of the characters ended headed on a path that they were happy with and that reflected their arcs and growth, so it was really satisfying.

The premise is a good one. Tina Das, a 32-year-old Indian American, has never felt entirely Indian or American but more like “other”. She is also unfulfilled in her job as she struggles to implement reality-type tv shows set in India…while living in Brooklyn. Hmmm.

My problem with this book was two-fold, and I almost gave up on it. First, it needs a good editor. The writing was frankly a mess…run-ons, POV from characters who make one-second pit-stops in the narrative, very abrupt changes in location/POV, etc. Secondly, the potential for a narrative about finding oneself within different ethnic cultures through growth and experience was wasted. Instead, it seemed as if it was trying to be the screenplay for a New Delhi version of Crazy Rich Asians (no, I haven’t read that book but saw the movie).

Tina, her best friend Marianne, her dad, her mom and her mom’s boyfriend travel to New Delhi for a week to attend her cousin’s lavish, over-the-top wedding. While there, she pushes herself to find an Indian boyfriend (Sid is a struggling personal trainer/drummer that she met on a previous trip and auditioned for a now defunct show) to become more of her “authentic” self. The narrative (as highlighted by Sid) takes a detour to showcase the socio-economic discrepancies in Indian society. But there is no redeeming of these self-absorbed, two-dimensional characters.

In the end, while Tina did finally make a decision about her future, I felt no real growth or maturity on her part (or any of the characters for that matter). Honestly, I came away not invested in the story or the characters at all and feeling rather cheated, which was disappointing with such potential.

Thanks to #NetGalley and #BallantineBooks for providing me the ARC. The opinions are strictly my own.

Tina, her best friend Marianne and her extended family are all invited to a huge family wedding in India. I love reading about international travel and this is liberally sprinkled with family drama. Basu has a very witty literary style that was easy to read but the main character's pathological ennui and the constant chaotic POV jumps put this at a three for me. I could round up to a 4 for the ending which I found hilarious, quirky and very satisfying. Definitely a fun read!
Thanks to NetGalley and Ballantine for the ARC in return for my honest review.

LOVE LOVE LOVE!

This is a super funny comedic novel. For me, it's often difficult to find a light-hearted comedy that makes me laugh. Especially during this quarantine! Destination Wedding made laughing easy though. Furthermore, it's vivid portrayal of this Indian wedding made turning to a new chapter like clicking next on a Neflix binge. A week in India was just the escape I was looking for in opening its cover!

Tina and her good friend Marianne travel to India for Tina's cousin's weeklong wedding celebration. Her divorced parents are also invited, along with her mother's boyfriend. A new friend of her father joins the festivities as well. A cute and fun read, although I found myself more interested in the lives of the parents than of Tina and Marianne. Their characters and storyline were more interesting!

Tina Das isn't sure where she belongs - India, America, Bombay or Delhi? No matter, though, because her cousin is getting married and it is the family's event of the year. The plan is a weeklong wedding in Delhi, and Tina's BFF is tagging along for the ride. Readers are in for a thrill they won't soon forget!

Tina and her friend Marianne are in Delhi, India to attend Tina’s cousin’s wedding. Tina’s divorced parents are attending, Radha with her boyfriend David, and Mr. Das. Mr. Das is meeting a woman he was introduced to by a matchmaker. There are many characters in the book, and some funny moments, but the main characters were spoiled and did not feel authentic to me. Tina’s parents and their love interests were more interesting. I really liked the author’s first book, but was not overly impressed with this one. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

This book has a nice plot and sounded like a great escape read. And while I loved the travel vibes (since, ya know, it’s been a while due to events-that-shall-not-be-named) and I always love wedding vibes (hopeless romantic here, but y’all already knew that)- this book just...fell flat. I had trouble with the way it flowed. One minute, I’d be reading from someone’s perspective and it would shift so suddenly that I would be confused for a moment before realizing I was actually receiving insight to a friend, a family member, or a shopkeeper’s assistant’s thoughts instead of our normal narrator’s

I really assumed this would be a five star read for me but I couldn’t get into this book. I felt like I was thrown in immediately but with no context and so much dialogue at the beginning that I felt overwhelmed with characters that I knew little to nothing about.

I was so excited to receive an ARC of Destination Wedding. Destination Wedding takes readers along a week long lavish wedding ceremony in India filled with romance, scandal and more drama than one can imagine. Tina, the main character, is 30 and from New York. She’s single, works as a minimally successful TV producer and her parents are recently divorced. Tina’s bff, Marianne, has traveled with her as her plus-one. Her mom has brought her new, younger American boyfriend and her father has agreed to meet a woman as a blind-date matchmaking program. The slew of characters is at times difficult to navigate, as there are so many with such big personalities. But, wow, they are an entertaining bunch! In her week long adventure, Tina is taken on a journey of discovering friendships, questioning romantic decisions, Delhi’s lifestyle and complicated family dynamics. Destination Wedding is rich with culture, detail and fun. Readers looking for an escape will enjoy the emersion that Destination Wedding provides.

A sincere thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for an ARC of the book in exchange for an honest review!

This book as recommended to me. I don't think I would have chosen it myself. I found myself intrigued by the two sides of life in India. Both extreme. The super rich and poor. The traffic. The class distinctions. The huge wedding.
Tina is torn between two cultures. Not fully immersed in either. Her parents divorce bothers her. I find it to be a friendship. I like her parents new partners. I was especially interested in her father's match made relationship. I would be interested in a sequel.
Thanks Netgalley for this selection.

The first 10% of this book was hard to follow because flowed together and after that it every character that appeared in the book had something to say and it was just very distracting. Almost all the characters were two dimensional and I didn't care for any of them. Very dialogue heavy and very little plot.

5/5 Stars wow..

At first it took a little bit to pick up but i kept reading and it just kept getting better and better..


What could go wrong at a lavish Indian wedding with your best friend and your entire family?

So many things happened and i loved every second of it.

This book had so many indian foods that kept making me hungry as i read and the outfits and everything about the indian culture that was in this book was beautiful to me and it educated me on stuff i didnt know about the culture.

Also this book had so much POC representation and also a little LGBTQ representation
this book was beautiful and im glad i read it and got sent an arc of it.

Thank you netgalley for sending me an arc for this book

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for giving me a copy of this book! After reading Diksha Basu's debut, the Windfall, I was looking forward to reading her next work. Destination Wedding focuses on Tina, her divorced parents, and her best friend Marianne, all of whom are in Delhi for a wedding. Initially, I found this quite hard to get into, as the writing style seemed a little stilted. However, I soon found myself absorbed in the characters' histories and dilemmas. I liked the commentary on finding it hard to fit in anywhere when you're a child of immigrants (Tina is American, with Indian parents), and feeling generally aimless. It was also refreshing to see her parents handling dating post their divorce. The one thing I wasn't sure about was Marianne's story (a character who is not quite happy with herself), it seemed rushed. Otherwise, the descriptions of Delhi and its inhabitants were well done, I felt like I was there. All in all, an enjoyable read.

I have to admit I tried getting into this 3 times and just couldn't do it. There were run on sentences, and it rambled on.

Overall, I was quite underwhelmed. This book seems like it would almost be a better movie than a book.

Liked: The portrayal of a multigenerational Indian family in the United States and back in India. I much preferred the storylines of the older adults than the stories of the younger ones. There were multiple POVs (albeit too many), but they were very easy to follow, which usually isn't the case.

Didn't Like: Quite slow paced. I liked the multiple POVs, but I didn't really need the random back stories and thoughts of the non-relevant characters (like the flight attendant, random driver, or the spouse of driver). I didn’t like for Tina or Marianne. They were just financially privileged, whiny girls for most of the book. Characters were underdeveloped.

Destination Wedding centers around Tina, an Indian-American woman, who travels to India for a wedding celebration. The author did a fantastic job blending traditional and contemporary cultures. Reading about India, from the landscape to the culture to the daily lives of its people, left me breathless. It was written with such vivid detail, I felt as though I were truly a guest at this wedding with Tina.

An easy, light-hearted, yet memorable, read, Destination Wedding has themes involving family tension, social standing, and self-identity. I recommend this one to anyone who enjoys contemporary fiction with smart, engaging writing.

DNF
This book really needed an editor. There were so many rambling non-sequiters that it was hard to follow the story. Example: main characters are flying... There's a whole run-on sentence paragraph on the backstory of the flight attendant. Was it relevant? Not that I could find.... Millions more examples.

I appreciate the opportunity to have an ARC of this book, and hope people will enjoy it and publishers will continue to seek out black and brown stories.

#netgalley #destinationwedding