“Brilliant idea! Excellent! Muslim dating? Well, I had no idea you were allowed to date.’ Then he leaned towards me and looked at me sympathetically. ‘Are your parents quite disappointed?’
Unlucky in love once again after her possible-marriage-partner-to-be proves a little too close to his parents, Sofia Khan is ready to renounce men for good. Or at least she was, until her boss persuades her to write a tell-all expose about the Muslim dating scene.
As her woes become her work, Sofia must lean on the support of her brilliant friends, baffled colleagues and baffling parents as she goes in search of stories for her book. In amongst the marriage-crazy relatives, racist tube passengers and decidedly odd online daters, could there be a a lingering possibility that she might just be falling in love . . . ?
Find the book on Goodreads.
I picked this one up on a whim after seeing Leena Norms recommend it. She didn’t just recommend it though, she totally convinced me to buy it through the way in which she spoke about it – which is exactly how I imagine I look and sound when I’ve recently read a book that I absolutely bloody loved. Plus, there were some Bridget Jones comparisons in there, as though I wasn’t completely sold already.
So, I liked this book a lot. I read it in one sitting as though I was watching a rom com, and it was a fun afternoon read. The main character is interesting and different (not just because of her ethnicity, although, of course, that’s also true in the world of contemporary romance.) and she has the exact well meaning but frustrating family and dating history that you would expect from this kind of story. It all works very well, although I’m not a super fan of the diary style narration, and I laughed in all the right places.
The love interests themselves is where things get a bit…. ehhh. I really liked the nextdoor neighbour, but the other men in the book felt a bit one dimensional. And some of the subplots were a bit of something and nothing. And I hated the way the ‘big misunderstanding’ played out and thus, the way Malik wrapped everything up. Which was a shame, but is something of a pattern I am finding with the books I am reading at the moment. If you are a fan of the good old classic rom com though, definitely give this book a go.
Lost Beyond The Wall 