I know I am a full month late on this one, but with National Novel Writing Month I got distracted and am just now managing to finish this one. I want to be up front and claim all the fault for this. This novel was great, I enjoyed it for reasons I will expand on in just a moment, but there were parts in the narrative that sort of slowed down just a bit. With those parts lining up with me having to put the book down for whatever reason, I was slow to pick it back up for a few days. This meant this book took far longer than it should have when it was actually a good read. All my fault.
Let me tell you what the story is about: Viva was young when she left India after her parents and sister had died, but now she has reason to return thanks to a letter from an old friend of her mother's saying that she had found a trunk of Viva's parent's and would she kindly do something with it. So to help pay her way, Viva takes on the job of chaperone for other young people making the trip to India: Guy, a young man rejoining his parents after being away at school for so long. Rose, a young woman headed to India to get married to a soldier who had proposed after a very short acquaintanceship. And Tor, Rose's best friend and bridesmaid who is looking to find an escape from her mother. All three women find themselves in a very different world with their lives turned upside down. While maintaining their friendship in this new land, they also grow individually into very different people.
So, why did I like it? Because it was complex. Gregson took three main women and put them in a foreign land and left them to their own devices. Things got chaotic. Specially when the women were so different from each other which led to very different paths begin taken and a very wide range of events to tell of. Which is why this book was a bit longer than what I have been reading lately (with the very notable exception of Game of Thrones). There was far more story for Gregson to tell. And she did it wonderfully!
Not only did the story wind along various paths, but the characters she gives us changed greatly over the course of the novel. Even the characters that we would consider minor, unimportant to the main story, seemed to develop thanks to the things the leading ladies did. I greatly enjoyed the final result of this.
So I encourage everyone to take a chance on this. Pick it up and enjoy the wonderful characters and story that Gregson works with to make a tale that is truly fascinating and touching.
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