Reviews with content warning for Death - Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows

Reviews tagging 'Death'

Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal

38 reviews

raeich's review against another edition

emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This book does such a clever job of shifting and widening one's perspective about choice, traditionalism, honor, feminism, and liberation in the context of strong cultural and modern values.

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matmatmatty's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional informative mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

This story focuses on a Sikh community in Southall, London where a young "modern" woman is hired to teach a literacy class (although she thinks it's a creative writing class) and while giving her students (who are, of course, the titular Punjabi widows) the confidence to express themselves properly, she starts to uncover the truth about some of the community's secrets.

I really liked the dynamic between the m in characters- coming from a religious immigrant community myself, I could completely understand Nikki's thinking and the way she acts, but could also see some of my family in Kulwinder and some of the widows.

This book gave me a lot to think about - from how our safe communities can become toxic, to how it's important to stand up to our ideals even if the world is against us.

I know what happened to Maya does happen - there was a lot of talk of "honour killings" in the UK a few years ago, but it sometimes feel like things are out of our hands with things like this, and this story helped me realise that it doesn't have to be.

Really loved this book and looking forward to reading more from this author!

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serenspace's review against another edition

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dark funny mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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dani_reis's review against another edition

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slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

3.0

Kind of bored with the pace feeling too slow. Bit too much like an anthology of erotica, which I should have expected.

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mshiley's review against another edition

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emotional funny mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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julialeigh's review against another edition

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funny hopeful inspiring mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

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paigereitz's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful informative mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

I really enjoyed this book. It was such an interesting exploration of culture and religion and multi-generational families navigating those challenges. From my vantage point, it tackled culture and varying levels of conservatism within Sikhism remarkably well, allowing the women to be people - not caricatures of their culture. And listening to the audiobook was lovely.

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