A review by lhhrmn
Members Only by Sameer Pandya

3.0

This was maybe not the best book to start reading the day of an attempted coup, but it was the only other 14-day loan book in my stack, so I felt like I should read it sooner than any others in the pile. I could certainly empathize with Raj and as a white woman, understand that I may never truly know what it is like to feel like every day requires a conscious, exhaustive attempt to fit into to a culture other than my own. That being said, Raj appeared to make poor decision after poor decision that made it difficult at times to feel sympathy for his actions and choice of words. Sure, we've all said or done something that in retrospect we wish we hadn't and of course, it may be (ok, just plain IS) more damning as a person of color, but some of the scenes and actions didn't exactly feel like "Raj trying his best" and instead felt like "Raj putting his foot in his mouth, again". I was ready to be done with this one before it quite ended.