**Book Review: Desi Matchmaking**

Desi Matchmaking by Sarah Desai is a novel that follows the story of Laila, an Indian American woman who is looking for love. The book begins with Laila's boyfriend cheating on her, and she decides to move back home to San Francisco to be with her parents who own an Indian restaurant. Laila wants to use the office above her dad's restaurant to conduct business, but she discovers that her dad has also leased it out to another guy named Sam. Despite their initial disagreements, they end up sharing the office anyway.

As Laila navigates her new life in San Francisco, she decides to participate in a matchmaking site called Desi Match, which her dad sets up for her. The site is designed to find Indian American women matches with suitable grooms, and Laila's dad promises to help her find the perfect partner. However, Sam, who has accompanied Laila on these dates, keeps showing up at every match and tries to "help" weed out the unsuitable candidates.

Throughout the book, Laila and Sam engage in witty banter that becomes a highlight of the story. Their hate-to-love romance is palpable, and their interactions are always entertaining. However, some aspects of their relationship leave much to be desired. Sam's wishy-washy nature and his tendency to make questionable decisions raise some concerns about his character.

One major plot point occurs at around 75% of the book, which has a significant impact on the story. While it's not possible to discuss this without giving away spoilers, let's just say that it's an important moment in Laila's journey. It's worth noting that opinions may vary about whether or not this event is forgivable.

Despite some issues with Sam's character and the plot twist, Desi Matchmaking has a lot of positives. The author does a great job of incorporating Indian culture and cuisine into the story, which adds depth and authenticity to Laila's experiences. Her parents are particularly well-developed, with their own unique personalities and quirks.

Laila herself is a strong and independent protagonist who embodies feminist values. She's eager to break free from traditional expectations and forge her own path in life. As someone who isn't Indian American, I found it fascinating to learn about Laila's culture and experiences through the author's lens.

Overall, Desi Matchmaking has its flaws, but it also offers some enjoyable moments. Fans of hate-to-love romances and banter-filled relationships will likely enjoy this book. If you're looking for a light, fun read with a strong female lead, Desi Matchmaking might be worth checking out. However, readers who prefer more complex characters or plot twists may find the book lacking.

**Rating: 3/5**

For those interested in hate-to-love romances, banter-filled relationships, or Indian American culture and cuisine, Desi Matchmaking is a great option. If you've read this book, I'd love to hear your thoughts on it! Please leave comments below.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhello everyone today I'm here to do another recent read so the day is going to be romance editions so all the books I'm talking about today or adult romance wrong calm contemporary whatever I don't want to classify it under I get complicate gets complicated sometimes with that but I'm talking about four books today and these are the books I also read for the romance of thon which was a read-a-thon took place at the end of June that I participated in and I vlog so I linked the vlog if you want to see me like read those in real time and thought the top these are gonna be more detailed and structured thoughts on them as always there will be timestamps down below if you want to hear about one book in particular if you spoiler-free i'm going to show you what the book is about what i liked about it what i didn't like about it and what i read it is the books i will be talking about today are the player next door by Kate Tucker take a hit Danny Brown by Thalia Hibbert the boyfriend project by her or Sean and the marriage game by Sara Desai let's get into it so the first book is the player next door by Kate Tucker this is like my fourth or fifth okay Tucker book she writes a lot of new adult adult romances and this is her latest one that self-published if I'm not mistaken so we start off with a book with the character named Scarlett who is 17 a high school senior and her seniors just beginning and she is heartbroken because her boyfriend over the summer they had a really hot and heavy summer saying think of like Danny and Sandy I love Greece and he broke up with her at the very beginning of the school year because he said things were getting too serious and things like that and she is obviously very heartbroken he's moved on and she's just she doesn't like him and she really meant she moves away as soon as high school is done to go to college and get away as far as possible and now 19 years later when the book really picks up and she moves back home to her hometown because she buys a house and she gets a job at a teacher she gets a job as a teacher in a local school and and who should move next door is the guy who broke her heart 12 years ago Shane and obviously she's still having a lot of feelings towards him as far as like anger and resentment and just really in happiness and this book obviously if you can't tell us a second chance romance of Scarlett and Shane reigniting the flame that was once lit he starts to try to be her friend and he realizes I still has healing for her and obviously second-chance romance again like I said I really enjoyed this book I gave it a 3 out of 5 the one thing you didn't like about it was Scarlett Scarlett was so upset half the time that Shane and I get that it was granted because he broke her heart when they were 17 but half of me thinks that it wasn't a super long relationship it was happened when they were very very young I think she was just so angry for such a long time at him and I don't want to say it wasn't warranted because your feelings are always validated through your feelings but it just like it she just clung on to it for so long eventually as you can tell she overcomes it but that was a bit qualms I had what the book was just like she was still so mad about those three months and I'm just like this happened 12 years ago for what happened two years ago yeah you'd still be mad all you want because I would be too but I don't know maybe I'm the only one that feels that way but I enjoyed it it was steamy it was fun um it had a second-chance romance like I said so I get 3 out of 5 it was solid I didn't love it nor did I really just liked it by any means not to take a hint Danny Brown by Thalia Ebert this is the second book in the I don't know what Dakota Brown sisters trilogy because each book follows a Brown sisterhood the first book was get a life Chloe brown and obviously we're focusing on Danny Brown her sister in this book so we follow you guessed it Danny Brown who is a plus-sized black woman that has shockingly pink hair and his English professor and just a overall bad a I love her and she works as a english professor like I said and one day there's like this fire drill that happens she gets stuck in the elevator and then her friend who's also a security worker in the building where she works is a fear or staff saves her like fireman style and everything and somebody videos it and it goes viral and it becomes like hashtag rug baby cuz the fear was also a like once upon a time a professional rugby player and he's seeing how much attentions is getting online works this charity thing for rugby players for youth and he's realizing that this video is getting a lot of attention and donations are coming for this charity that he runs so he decides to know ask Danny hey let's can we fake date so I can really like help my charity out and things like that and she's all for it as always with all of my romance reviews you can guess what happens next because you clearly can't so this obviously has a fake dating romantic trope and turns into real feelings and I enjoyed it I love ty Herbert's books this is my third one written by her and all of her characters are just so warm and they're so brass and sassy and I just love them Danni is especially sassy she's also bisexual which I enjoyed and she just tells it like it is she knows how she feels she doesn't want relationships and she knows that she's not good in them but as the book progresses she opens up more about herself and then she just learns what to do in relationships and maybe she does want one and maybe zap is that guy which he is just the softest guy ever and he likes also romance books like what who is this man I would love to meet him but even at one point in this book he's listening to a romance book via audio and a certain scene a steamy scene comes up and accidentally Danny overhears it it's very awkward of us from its readers all been there he's just the epitome of a cinnamon roll just love him so I love this series of ton I cannot wait for the last book in the series which we follow Eve and it's just overall adorable I gave this a four or five the more I think about it I might bump it up to five out of five because I just did enjoyed the romance so very very much so freakin cute next up is the boyfriend project by forever shot this is all about a character named samaya who works in the IT field and she is doing this guy casually and they're supposed to go out this one night and he cancels on her and then she learns via Twitter that he is on a date with another woman at like the restaurant they were supposed to be yet and says she is obviously very upset she's like I'm gonna go down there and confront him and when she goes down there another woman is there that he's also dating and he's like two-timing her and then the girl that he's on the date with they are like you're a horrible person you're like playing all of us and the of course like the course of a lot of romance books a video goes viral of all these woman confronting this man and take him down as we should and these three women decide to be friends they decide to come up with this thing called the boyfriend project where they really focus on themselves for a year whether it be their career or hobbies and things like that of course Amaya takes in it to work she works at this app company that does a lot of Wi-Fi and things I don't know I'm not techie I don't understand it just let's say she works in the technology field she meets a new co-worker named Daniel and of course she has feelings for him but it's you know she doesn't want to do that because she really wants to focus on herself and it's a friends to Lover's I guess she could say with the really sweet romance I enjoyed this one I came to three out of five that's a lot of workplace talk which I love and simultaneously it depends on against the workplace I'm not really techie I don't understand the jargon with it so I didn't love it for that that's not to say everybody will not like it my husband's in the tech industry he loved reading about that stuff but I just didn't love it also there's a lot of parts in this book where the characters will just lie to each other Daniel in particular with his job and it was understandable but also hard to read about so I didn't love that as well but I loved samaya because she was a I don't know woman boss girl boss she was powerful she was good at her job and she has explains how hard it is to be a black woman in business because she has to always be on her AGame all the time she can't ever make a mistake because everyone's holding her to such high standards because she is a black woman in this high level industry and I really loved reading about that because I can't relate to that because I'm a white woman so I loved getting her perspective and learning how much harder black women have it and how they are amazing and they do all of these strong things so I loved her as a character she was strong and she knew what she wanted and she knew who she was so I gave it a three that's a solid when I say three and five some people take it as like it's solid book which I agree with or some people think you didn't like it a lot three to me is a good solid book I would recommend it I enjoyed this one last up we have the marriage game by sarah desai this is my character Laila who the beginning of the book this in New York with her boyfriend Jonas she comes home and he is cheating on her so she like throws all of his clothes and of course oh my gosh the theme of this video is it becomes a viral video I should have really thought about that as a theme that would have been great but she moves back home to San Francisco and with their parents who owned an Indian restaurant caught a touch of spice I believe or the spice rack I forget what it's and she wants to use the office above her dad's restaurant to kind of conduct business and she finds jobs for people I don't know what the exact word for that is but she learned that her dad has also leased out at the office to another guy named Sam and he doesn't want to share the office but they ended but they end up sharing it anyway Lila also learns that her dad has like put her on this matchmaking site called desi mat which I don't know if it's a real set or not but he pretty much puts a letter out there like this is my daughter I want to get her married please you know respond back if you want to but meet hers like you know get married to her and so she decides to go in these like ten dates or ten matches that her dad is set up for her and you know maybe I should fly marriage and things like that and Sam accompanies along with her to try to like help weed it out and they are very much hate to love romance they banter the whole book if you love bantering couples and like bantering romance at the banter game is strong in this like I said it's hate to love which is my favorite romance trope overall I gave this book a 3 out of 5 I liked it I didn't love it I love the bantering I love to hate the love aspect Sam as a character to me was just so wishy-washy there was a lot of redeemable qualities about him but there were some things that he did and said that I was just like no I think a lot of people in the review say something happens at 75% of this book that's really you don't think is that great and it's not forgivable it's on and that does happen in this book I don't want to spoil it for you and it's hard for me to say if like I think it's forgivable or not because I think it depends it depends on the person I don't know but Sam is a character I think like I said he's overall good but just you just don't about things wrong and says it does the wrong thing I don't know Lila is a strong lone female she's an Indian American and interesting to read about different cultures obviously I'm not indigent so I can't relate to this at all but I loved reading about her culture and how a lot of the suitors that she met really just wanted a wife that would cook that would clean that would stay home for the children and just be there just be a housewife and that's what the role is and a lot of cultures are like that and levo doesn't want to do that she's a feminist she wants to be able to work she wants to be able to do whatever she wants to do she has just to sit at home dutifully all the time and it's just interesting to read about the cultures but I loved Layla's family in this they were so supporting her Ference were amazing I did enjoyed that aspect but I did look I did really enjoy that aspect as well the family aspect was strong and of the overall learning about the Indian culture and cuisine obviously because her parents owned an Indian restaurant that has some Michelin stars go down but I like this one I didn't love it I will say if you're a big fan of the hate you love romance trope I would recommend checking it out three out of five I enjoyed it so there you have my thoughts on these four books imagine the other one right here ebook that's why I'm not holding it up but I don't have to say obviously because oh my favorite is take a head Danny Brown but all of them have great things like hate to love check fake-dating check kind of a slow burn friends love her checks so in case you're interested in any of those tropes check out these mugs if you've read any of them I would love to hear your thoughts on them so please leave them down below thank you guys so much for watching and I will see you my next video byehello everyone today I'm here to do another recent read so the day is going to be romance editions so all the books I'm talking about today or adult romance wrong calm contemporary whatever I don't want to classify it under I get complicate gets complicated sometimes with that but I'm talking about four books today and these are the books I also read for the romance of thon which was a read-a-thon took place at the end of June that I participated in and I vlog so I linked the vlog if you want to see me like read those in real time and thought the top these are gonna be more detailed and structured thoughts on them as always there will be timestamps down below if you want to hear about one book in particular if you spoiler-free i'm going to show you what the book is about what i liked about it what i didn't like about it and what i read it is the books i will be talking about today are the player next door by Kate Tucker take a hit Danny Brown by Thalia Hibbert the boyfriend project by her or Sean and the marriage game by Sara Desai let's get into it so the first book is the player next door by Kate Tucker this is like my fourth or fifth okay Tucker book she writes a lot of new adult adult romances and this is her latest one that self-published if I'm not mistaken so we start off with a book with the character named Scarlett who is 17 a high school senior and her seniors just beginning and she is heartbroken because her boyfriend over the summer they had a really hot and heavy summer saying think of like Danny and Sandy I love Greece and he broke up with her at the very beginning of the school year because he said things were getting too serious and things like that and she is obviously very heartbroken he's moved on and she's just she doesn't like him and she really meant she moves away as soon as high school is done to go to college and get away as far as possible and now 19 years later when the book really picks up and she moves back home to her hometown because she buys a house and she gets a job at a teacher she gets a job as a teacher in a local school and and who should move next door is the guy who broke her heart 12 years ago Shane and obviously she's still having a lot of feelings towards him as far as like anger and resentment and just really in happiness and this book obviously if you can't tell us a second chance romance of Scarlett and Shane reigniting the flame that was once lit he starts to try to be her friend and he realizes I still has healing for her and obviously second-chance romance again like I said I really enjoyed this book I gave it a 3 out of 5 the one thing you didn't like about it was Scarlett Scarlett was so upset half the time that Shane and I get that it was granted because he broke her heart when they were 17 but half of me thinks that it wasn't a super long relationship it was happened when they were very very young I think she was just so angry for such a long time at him and I don't want to say it wasn't warranted because your feelings are always validated through your feelings but it just like it she just clung on to it for so long eventually as you can tell she overcomes it but that was a bit qualms I had what the book was just like she was still so mad about those three months and I'm just like this happened 12 years ago for what happened two years ago yeah you'd still be mad all you want because I would be too but I don't know maybe I'm the only one that feels that way but I enjoyed it it was steamy it was fun um it had a second-chance romance like I said so I get 3 out of 5 it was solid I didn't love it nor did I really just liked it by any means not to take a hint Danny Brown by Thalia Ebert this is the second book in the I don't know what Dakota Brown sisters trilogy because each book follows a Brown sisterhood the first book was get a life Chloe brown and obviously we're focusing on Danny Brown her sister in this book so we follow you guessed it Danny Brown who is a plus-sized black woman that has shockingly pink hair and his English professor and just a overall bad a I love her and she works as a english professor like I said and one day there's like this fire drill that happens she gets stuck in the elevator and then her friend who's also a security worker in the building where she works is a fear or staff saves her like fireman style and everything and somebody videos it and it goes viral and it becomes like hashtag rug baby cuz the fear was also a like once upon a time a professional rugby player and he's seeing how much attentions is getting online works this charity thing for rugby players for youth and he's realizing that this video is getting a lot of attention and donations are coming for this charity that he runs so he decides to know ask Danny hey let's can we fake date so I can really like help my charity out and things like that and she's all for it as always with all of my romance reviews you can guess what happens next because you clearly can't so this obviously has a fake dating romantic trope and turns into real feelings and I enjoyed it I love ty Herbert's books this is my third one written by her and all of her characters are just so warm and they're so brass and sassy and I just love them Danni is especially sassy she's also bisexual which I enjoyed and she just tells it like it is she knows how she feels she doesn't want relationships and she knows that she's not good in them but as the book progresses she opens up more about herself and then she just learns what to do in relationships and maybe she does want one and maybe zap is that guy which he is just the softest guy ever and he likes also romance books like what who is this man I would love to meet him but even at one point in this book he's listening to a romance book via audio and a certain scene a steamy scene comes up and accidentally Danny overhears it it's very awkward of us from its readers all been there he's just the epitome of a cinnamon roll just love him so I love this series of ton I cannot wait for the last book in the series which we follow Eve and it's just overall adorable I gave this a four or five the more I think about it I might bump it up to five out of five because I just did enjoyed the romance so very very much so freakin cute next up is the boyfriend project by forever shot this is all about a character named samaya who works in the IT field and she is doing this guy casually and they're supposed to go out this one night and he cancels on her and then she learns via Twitter that he is on a date with another woman at like the restaurant they were supposed to be yet and says she is obviously very upset she's like I'm gonna go down there and confront him and when she goes down there another woman is there that he's also dating and he's like two-timing her and then the girl that he's on the date with they are like you're a horrible person you're like playing all of us and the of course like the course of a lot of romance books a video goes viral of all these woman confronting this man and take him down as we should and these three women decide to be friends they decide to come up with this thing called the boyfriend project where they really focus on themselves for a year whether it be their career or hobbies and things like that of course Amaya takes in it to work she works at this app company that does a lot of Wi-Fi and things I don't know I'm not techie I don't understand it just let's say she works in the technology field she meets a new co-worker named Daniel and of course she has feelings for him but it's you know she doesn't want to do that because she really wants to focus on herself and it's a friends to Lover's I guess she could say with the really sweet romance I enjoyed this one I came to three out of five that's a lot of workplace talk which I love and simultaneously it depends on against the workplace I'm not really techie I don't understand the jargon with it so I didn't love it for that that's not to say everybody will not like it my husband's in the tech industry he loved reading about that stuff but I just didn't love it also there's a lot of parts in this book where the characters will just lie to each other Daniel in particular with his job and it was understandable but also hard to read about so I didn't love that as well but I loved samaya because she was a I don't know woman boss girl boss she was powerful she was good at her job and she has explains how hard it is to be a black woman in business because she has to always be on her AGame all the time she can't ever make a mistake because everyone's holding her to such high standards because she is a black woman in this high level industry and I really loved reading about that because I can't relate to that because I'm a white woman so I loved getting her perspective and learning how much harder black women have it and how they are amazing and they do all of these strong things so I loved her as a character she was strong and she knew what she wanted and she knew who she was so I gave it a three that's a solid when I say three and five some people take it as like it's solid book which I agree with or some people think you didn't like it a lot three to me is a good solid book I would recommend it I enjoyed this one last up we have the marriage game by sarah desai this is my character Laila who the beginning of the book this in New York with her boyfriend Jonas she comes home and he is cheating on her so she like throws all of his clothes and of course oh my gosh the theme of this video is it becomes a viral video I should have really thought about that as a theme that would have been great but she moves back home to San Francisco and with their parents who owned an Indian restaurant caught a touch of spice I believe or the spice rack I forget what it's and she wants to use the office above her dad's restaurant to kind of conduct business and she finds jobs for people I don't know what the exact word for that is but she learned that her dad has also leased out at the office to another guy named Sam and he doesn't want to share the office but they ended but they end up sharing it anyway Lila also learns that her dad has like put her on this matchmaking site called desi mat which I don't know if it's a real set or not but he pretty much puts a letter out there like this is my daughter I want to get her married please you know respond back if you want to but meet hers like you know get married to her and so she decides to go in these like ten dates or ten matches that her dad is set up for her and you know maybe I should fly marriage and things like that and Sam accompanies along with her to try to like help weed it out and they are very much hate to love romance they banter the whole book if you love bantering couples and like bantering romance at the banter game is strong in this like I said it's hate to love which is my favorite romance trope overall I gave this book a 3 out of 5 I liked it I didn't love it I love the bantering I love to hate the love aspect Sam as a character to me was just so wishy-washy there was a lot of redeemable qualities about him but there were some things that he did and said that I was just like no I think a lot of people in the review say something happens at 75% of this book that's really you don't think is that great and it's not forgivable it's on and that does happen in this book I don't want to spoil it for you and it's hard for me to say if like I think it's forgivable or not because I think it depends it depends on the person I don't know but Sam is a character I think like I said he's overall good but just you just don't about things wrong and says it does the wrong thing I don't know Lila is a strong lone female she's an Indian American and interesting to read about different cultures obviously I'm not indigent so I can't relate to this at all but I loved reading about her culture and how a lot of the suitors that she met really just wanted a wife that would cook that would clean that would stay home for the children and just be there just be a housewife and that's what the role is and a lot of cultures are like that and levo doesn't want to do that she's a feminist she wants to be able to work she wants to be able to do whatever she wants to do she has just to sit at home dutifully all the time and it's just interesting to read about the cultures but I loved Layla's family in this they were so supporting her Ference were amazing I did enjoyed that aspect but I did look I did really enjoy that aspect as well the family aspect was strong and of the overall learning about the Indian culture and cuisine obviously because her parents owned an Indian restaurant that has some Michelin stars go down but I like this one I didn't love it I will say if you're a big fan of the hate you love romance trope I would recommend checking it out three out of five I enjoyed it so there you have my thoughts on these four books imagine the other one right here ebook that's why I'm not holding it up but I don't have to say obviously because oh my favorite is take a head Danny Brown but all of them have great things like hate to love check fake-dating check kind of a slow burn friends love her checks so in case you're interested in any of those tropes check out these mugs if you've read any of them I would love to hear your thoughts on them so please leave them down below thank you guys so much for watching and I will see you my next video bye\n"