Arjun and Madhuri both have the same culture and customs but they handle them very different. Arjun is proud of his culture while Madhuri is ashamed of it. And this makes sense because she was bullied multiple times about it. I just thought she was really rude to her mother when it came to some aspects of her culture. I think Madhuri could have handled it better. I was happy that near the end of the book she started to become more confident and she started to embrace her culture again. I actually started to like Madhuri near the end of the book. I thought that the culture talk throughout the book was very interesting. I loved getting to know more about the Indian culture and I even found myself looking things up after reading it in the book to try to understand more about it. KISMAT CONNECTION doesn’t release until June 13, 2023. As of December 2022, I have now read this book THREE TIMES. Let me tell you why.

Kismat Connection is a story that asks us about fate and how we let it control us. I loved this dual POV contemporary which made me feel some big feelings. Keep reading this book review for my full thoughts. Summary Authors, if you are a member of the Goodreads Author Program, you can edit information about your own books. Find out how in this guide.Madhuri and Arjun are a couple to root for with their nuanced love for and history with each other and I spent half the book crying for them, half internally yelling at them to just be together for real already while simultaneously swooning, and all of the book loving them with my entire heart.

Her love for storytelling began on Wattpad, where she grew her audience as a Featured Author, and she later went on to win first place in TeenPit 2019. Now, Ananya writes young adult romance novels featuring chaotic Desi teenagers, swoon-worthy banter, and lighthearted drama with a speculative twist. In her free time, she can be found watching her favorite Ananya Devarajan is in her fourth and final year at the University of California, Irvine, where she is pursuing a major in Neurobiology and Behavior as well as a minor in English. After graduation, she will be attending medical school at the Touro College of Osteopathic Medicine in Middletown, New York. Like many of her characters, Ananya is a second-generation Indian American young adult. In this charming YA debut, a girl who’s determined to prove her star chart wrong ropes her longtime best friend into an experimental relationship—not knowing that he has been in love with her for years. Kismat Connection is a cute friend-to-lovers that you can't help but enjoy. It wasn't perfect, but it was enjoyable and I found myself smiling at so many scenes. Kismat Connection is a joyful tale about the journeys we take to find romantic love, build our friendships, and celebrate our communities. A warm, feel good read, and a stunning debut."—Ali Hazelwood, New York Times bestselling author of The Love Hypothesis the answer is everything. throughout the whole book we are only being told about what’s happening but it’s never shown. there was no development, neither in the characters nor in the plot. the fake dating lasted five seconds, i swear. madhuri and arjun are friends and arjun has feelings for madhuri that are unrequited. but, we get an insta love out of nowhere. their dialogue was so unnatural and something that no teen would say nowadays. it felt strained and i cringed the whole time. it’s obvious that the author tried a little too hard. i just couldn’t find one likeable character in this book and at that point i should’ve just given up on it completely.

I think the character relationships and interactions were the weakest part of this book. Every singly interaction was so sterile, even the ones that were supposed to be messy. Every conversation was just people saying the perfect things and articulating their emotions verbatim. It felt like a scripted conversation you have in group therapy to practice using different skills. Like when you practice your “I Feels”. No one talks like that, and its so ingenuine and honestly boring to read. A book needs drama, and almost every argument in this book ended with a too-perfect apology within a paragraph. There was no emotions. It was robotic. And finally, KISMAT is a love letter to love. Reading Arjun and Madhuri’s journeys to each other was such a treat. I could not stop rooting for them as Devarajan explored their nuanced histories and relationships for one another. Watching them grow to be the Best Possible Person for one another was a real joy. Buch. Condition: Neu. Neuware -'A warm, feel good read.' -Ali Hazelwood, New York Times bestselling author of The Love Hypothesis'A gorgeous debut.' -Christina Lauren, New York Times bestselling authors of The UnhoneymoonersIn this charming YA debut, a girl who's determined to prove her star chart wrong ropes her longtime best friend into an experimental relationship-not knowing that he has been in love with her for years.Is it possible to change your fate Madhuri Iyer is doomed. Doomed for her upcoming senior year to be a total failure, according to her astrology-obsessed mother, and doomed to a happily ever after with her first boyfriend, according to her family curse.Determined to prove the existence of her free will, Madhuri devises an experimental relationship with the one boy she knows she'll never fall for: her childhood best friend, Arjun Mehta. But Arjun's feelings for her are a variable she didn't account for.As Madhuri starts to fall for her experimental boyfriend, she'll have to decide if charting her own destiny is worth breaking Arjun's heart-and her own. 304 pp. Englisch. Kismat Connection's nuanced approach to Desi destiny shows that Ananya Devarajan is an author to watch."—Award-winning author Nisha Sharma

I normally love friends to lovers trope but the way it was done here.. Ehhh. It could have been way better.

As Madhuri starts to fall for her experimental boyfriend, she’ll have to decide if charting her own destiny is worth breaking Arjun’s heart—and her own. thank you to netgalley and inkyard press for providing me with an arc of this book in exchange for an honest review.

KISMAT is a love letter to communication. Not just in the sense that it was beautifully written and filled with evocative images, but with the honest communication between characters. It was really refreshing to read such clear and honest communication and to read characters who try their best to be as honest as they can with each other. I need more books with clear and honest communication!! There’s something about a headstrong girl and a soft boy who falls first that is my book kryptonite, and Kismat Connection has it all and then some. A gorgeous debut about self-acceptance, love, and finding your own path."—Christina Lauren, New York Times bestselling authors of The Unhoneymooners arjun gets a very positive astrology reading, madhuri gets a very negative astrology reading. and then separately, madjuri has a family curse where the women always marry the first man they date. and to combat the curse, madjuri wants to not-fake-date arjun. it's real dating. but there is a deadline for when the relationship ends. it feels fake; she doesn't have feelings for him until she does, which is a normal trope for fake dating. but arjun has loved her for like, a decade. so it's not fake dating, it's not a fling where they're both into it until the deadline. it's this third weird gray area where i am not interested in what's happening because i know that arjun loves her and i know that madjuri needs to get over herself before they can be happy. but i am not interested in madhuri coming to terms with the family "curse". Madhuri is determined to break the prophecy of her mother's reading before time is up and when she creates an experiment of sorts with Arjun, she's sure she has the leg up here. Unfortunately for her, the universe has ways of following through with its plans even when you try your damnedest to get ahead. Arjun agrees to the experiment because he has only ever had eyes for Madhuri, and maybe this is his shot to make her see things the same as him but her determination has the power to get in between them if he's not careful.KISMAT is also a love letter to family. I adored the way Devarajan wrote her family relationships, especially the found-family relationship between Arjun and Auntie Iyer. Family is depicted as something you can lean on and trust, always knowing it is there if you need help. KISMAT also emphasizes that family can also be made, and is so much more than what you are born into. This message was such a comfort to read, and I really enjoyed the hug-like feeling I got every time I saw characters comfort each other, as families do. Finally, I really enjoyed the way Devarajan incorporated Indian culture. She did so in many ways, and I particularly loved that Bharatanatyam was such a huge part of Madhuri’s identity.