Some might describe Pinky Kaur as “a temptuous bitch.”

No, no one has.

But she can be bull-headed, impulsive, and a provoker, always on a short fuse ready to fight for a worthy cause. And much like everyone’s favorite heroine, Kat from the movie 10 Things I Hate about You this has the case of everyone seeing Pinky as troublemaking outcast that won’t play by any rules, especially her mother.

Despite the title and yes there’s a poem involved too, the plot isn’t an homage to the movie. Rather is a relationship of convenience that pushes Pinky and Samir together just like a Heath Ledger rom-com as Pinky’s cousin says.

Menon brings her wonderful sense of romance once again as she brings these total opposites together for a summer of evolution and pushing past fears, so let’s get to it!

As readers may remember Pinky from Menon’s previous novel There’s Something About Sweetie, she’s a hardcore activist which pushes against her straitlaced corporate lawyer parents. Well more like her mother whose nicknamed ‘The Shark.’ As with her other books, Menon explores the temptuous complications of another distinct mother-daughter relationship in which these two seem to have nothing in common, and her mother constantly heaps criticism and Pinky retaliates by purposefully goading her more.

It’s intense and there’s more under the surface but it is in this difficult relationship where Pinky is viewed as irresponsible and immature that her mother flings the unfounded accusation that Pinky burned down the barn at their lake house.

It wasn’t her and it is especially infruriating to Pinky that her mother’s apology is couched in a “Can you blame me? Look at all your previous decisions like your deliquent boyfriends” sort of response. It’s in that heated moment that Pinky proclaims she’s dating a good boy, one that doesn’t steal hubcaps that her parents would totally approve of. And now she can’t back out of it.

Luckily for Pinky’s rash mouth, Samir is on the East Coast and his law internship just fell through. Dangling the chance to work under ‘The Shark’s’ law firm when the summer is over, Samir impulsively accepts Pinky’s preposition, be her fake boyfriend.

Of course this hastily-made plan gets a splash of reality when they’re forced in enclosed space as their differences in living shine through. Pinky lives fully and wildly while Samir literally plans things to the last detail and checks them off in his planner. It’s like rubbing salt into a wound as they fight over almost everything with the underlying pain as Pinky sees how easily Samir integrates himself into her family and Samir feels Pinky is just a brat who won’t accept help that she literally asked him for.

I’ll admit I was somewhat on Samir’s side as Pinky does seem like she’s always looking for a fight but Menon knows what she’s doing as the reader and Samir begin to see past her glares to the vulnerabilities she hides beneath, the fear of being to emotionally close to someone and getting rejected. In fact, even Pinky begins to re-evaluate herself as Samir asks her some pointed questions that she had never reflected about herself.

As for Samir, he has definately grown from the home-schooled mama’s boy nuisance he was in There’s Something about Sweetie. He still loves his mom but he can read the room better now which translates him to being a calm, steadying presence who holds a spine of steel when in the midst of confrontation. He has no guile, he doesn’t play games and is just so sweet.

However, he also felt a bit subdued compared to Pinky’s boldness. Menon dances around the possibility of him having some mental health issues and Pinky delivers a much needed suggestion that he and his mother try therapy to talk through his control issues and the fear that something bad will happen if he doesn’t do everything. It’s a good plot point as Menon writes that there is such a stigma around mental health especially in the Indian-American community but it falls into the wayside with everything else going on.
Same with the ending with Samir’s talk with his mom about going to a mainstream school. At the beginning it seemed like that would be a bigger plot point but it is resolved easily and off-page and it left me wanting more. Menon does such an excellent job with her mother-daughter relationships so it would have been interesting to see her flesh out the dynamic between Samir and his mother who are so close but her cancer scare had put pressure on him to be the other adult and feel obligated to stay near her.

But that’s not the point of the story, the point is the romance and the slope from fighting to playful banter to real relationship was gradual and realistic as Samir and Pinky begin to share more moments together, most poignantly on the rooftop, that one begins to root for the relationship to work and see that they’ll be able to make it despite their own personalities initially blocking the way.

It also helps that they have a common cause to fight for when Pinky’s beloved butterfly habitat is set up to be razed for more soulless corporate condos. Menon describes the nature reserve beautifully thus making the fight more personal as she imbues the location with incredible personal memories. Not just with Pinky’s family but the local residents and shows the power of community protest, making the end that much more satisfying.

Plus there is all the other subplots and relationships that make it more satisfying like Drama Queen, the possum (or opossum depending if you want to be terminology-accute like Samir) who ‘dies’ at any possible moment; The Boggle tournaments that the Kaur-Montclair families host of which her father is intensely competitive; Dolly, Pinky’s cousin who is also going through her own journey and branching out from being ‘boring vanilla’ do-gooder box that fits in. Even though part of that journey involves the douchiest of douches.

Which is what it’s all about especially for Pinky and Samir as they begin to navigate their own ideas of their personality and expectations of themselves and how others would view them. Especially Pinky as she reconciles her idea of being the free-spirited thinker and what does it mean if she starts dating Samir when on paper he seems totally wrong. It also ties in nicely with the story thread of Pinky’s mother and Samir learning to push past his fears. He also puts it best that they may not seem right on paper, it doesn’t mean anything. You just got to have faith and go for the person that makes you happy.

4 stars!