Born Confused

One of the best books I’ve read in a long time – beautifully written, very complex, a true work of literature. Touches upon all aspects of being a teenager and should have universal appeal.

I read this because my book club did, otherwise I never would have selected it on my own. I have a strong dislike of whiny adolescent existential BS in any form, and this book is pretty much based on whiny adolescent existentialism. As a first generation American, I appreciate the exploration of

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acculturation, but it's been done better.

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I loved this book! I enjoyed learning about another culture; however, I haven't been able to convince any students to read it. It is a really good coming of age story.

This book is a rare treat, in that it presents the life of a typical American teenager with an atypical life, is honest, but doesn't stoop to cliches and stereotypes to tell its tale. This is the story of Dimple Lala, a young woman, born and raised in New Jersey of Indian immigrant parents, who is

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turning 17 at the beginning of summer. Dimple rejects her parents old-world culture and wants to be an All-American girl, but everyone else sees her as Indian. For her parents, Dimple getting drunk once while out with friends on her birthday is cause for a silent treatment and punishment of international proportions. In one of my favorite lines from the book, Dimple's mother says, "Giving birth to you was easy. It is now that I am needing the epidural!"
Dimple, in comparison to her childhood friend, Gwyn, is positively a model child: a good student, a virgin who has only dated two boys, she doesn't do drugs or do anything out of the ordinary to cause her parents to worry. It turns out that both Dimple and her parents are failing to realize what they have: a caring, lovely family unit and a strong cultural background in Dimple's case, and a very good daughter, in the case of her parents. Dimple's friend, Gwyn, is beautiful and blonde and slim and the center of attention, but she comes from a home where she was abandoned by her father and ignored by her mother, and she craves the stability of Dimple's family unit, which, of course, Dimple does not understand, since she longs to be beautiful and blonde and free of parental restrictions.

Dimple's parents seek to control their daughter by introducing her to a "suitable boy" meaning, of course, another Indian boy, an NYU computer major, and the son of her mother's best friend. Dimple rejects the boy on principal, but then discovers that he is a slightly unsuitable boy, and begins to fall in love with him, along with her friend, Gwyn. Dimple spends the bulk of the novel discovering herself and her life, and realizing that what she has is really a gift. She is exposed to the temptations of teenaged life, she has her heart broken and she rebels against her parents, but it takes a long summer for her to see that everything she has really is something to be envied.

The book is written in a charming, witty style, and, except for a few sort of "romance novel" plot twists, it is very engrossing. It is perfect for both adults and teens, and really should be read by parents and their teenagers.

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Born confused... ABCD (American Born Confused Desi - "Desi" meaning "Indian"... Marvelous, witty, insightful writing. The protagonist is a 17-year old daughter of Indian immigrants. And on behalf of my own daughter, I felt that I could acutely relate to the soul searching of this character. I know

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that my daughter have gone through similar agonizing while growing up (even more so, probably, as she was the product of two different cultures). The author has captured so skillfully the nuances of the life of the immigrant family - the sadness for the world left behind, the unavoidable adjustments which might be out of character in the new land but still necessary, the compassionate humor of trying to fit in, and the triumph of some old truths. The story is told eloquently and beautifully.

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This is a wonderful coming-of-age story set in New Jersey (and occasionally New York City) told through the eyes of Dimple Lala, an American-Born Confused Indian. Dimple has been focused on her photography for the past few years, a hobby that she hopes to turn into a career one day. But while

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hiding behind her lens, her best friend Gwyn begins to steal parts of Dimple's life: her culture, her loves and her identity. During the summer before her senior year, Dimple descovers who she is and who she ultimately wants to be.

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Born Confused a story about 17 year old Dimple Lala an Indian Girl growing up in New Jersey. Dimple Lala rejects her immigrant parents old ideas and ultimatley struggles between her Indian and American identity. She sees her brown skin and wide hips as being an outkast. Dimple Lala is an avid

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photographer and takes many pictures including of her best friend Gwyn. Dimple Lala compares herself to Gwyn who is a great student, beautiful,skinny and has independent life Dimple Lala wants. Dimple Lala compares herself to Gwyn constantly. "In our case the rich girl who lives like an orpahn and the little brown girl who existed as if she were still umbilically attached to her parents." Dimple Lala just got over a breakup with her boyfriend, and now her parents have found a boy named Karsh who they find good for her. Dimple Lala first doesn't like boy, but soon begins to fall for him.

This is a great book that I would recommend to anyone. It's a long book (500 pgs.) that will keep you reading. The book deals with so many issues like love, identity, and friendship. The story is very realistic even though it's fiction. So if you want a long read with a great story and drama I would definitely reccomend this book!

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Born Confused is the story of 17 year old Dimple Lala, an Indian-American girl who feels "not quite Indian and not quite American." Dimple is best friends with blonde-haired, blue eyed Gwyn. Dimple's identity crisis comes to a head when her parents decide to fix her up with a "suitable Indian boy"

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hoping that she will marry one eventually. They introduce her to Karsh, the son of their friends from India. Dimple is not impressed with Karsh on first meeting him but Gwyn is so Dimple helps Gwyn pursue him. Along the way she embarks on a journey of self-discovery.

I liked this book a lot and learned a lot about Indian-America culture and perspectives from it. I listened to the audio book and the narrator, Marguerite Gavin did a fabulous job. She did a wide range of Indian, British, and Teenager accents flawlessly.

The only thing I didn't like about this book was that the pace could be really slow at times. The author had several times when she got on a descriptive tangent, using all kinds of over the top metaphors when I really just wanted her to get on with the story. The book is told in first person from Dimple's point of view and it was pretty unbelievable that a 17 year old had that kind of language skills, especially since this book is classified as young adult.

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The book contains some rather abrupt and dissonance-causing characterization shifts.

RGG: Teenage girl angst story with a best friend, a boy, and the struggle to fit in.

I adored this book. It started a little rough for me, Hidier's exuberant restretching unforming rebubbling of the language was abrupt. But once I dove in, let the words into my ear, let them bounce and scintillate and dance, then I was wholly present. Straightforward, age-old plot made very fresh

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here. Everyone in this book does some growing in very believable, sometimes painful ways. I loved the glimpse into both the Indian culture of Dimple's parents, and the hybrid dynamic culture of Dimple's peers. My heart ached for some of the kids I met herein, they were all very real people doing the best they can.

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Couldn't finish this book as the authoress was trying really hard to be funny. She failed miserably while creating a stereotypical book of American teen melodramatic TV shows.

Didn't finish it but instead passed it onto our secondary school library due to a drug incident and some discussions about sex in the story.

Book starts out promisingly, with a fresh, thoughtful hiphop voice, but bogged down about 1/3 through. The "adverbalizing" of words (funnily, ropily) and made-up words (cosmopolitanation, drink-sticky, daquiried) and constant metaphors (my heart a hummingbird in my wrists) become less charming and

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more annoying. Characters are generally well-defined; the best-portrayed relationships are of Dimple with her parents, Gwyn, and Kavita.

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What I needed. Review to come.

Alright, I'm actually going to try to review this. Given I am an Indian young person, maybe my perspective will count for something.

The review will have mild spoilers.

I liked the writing style as I feel the author didn't explain too much (although she did at times)

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and the style was mock-lyrical prose. However, the dashes instead of quotation marks when a person was talking, seemed to give a sense that Dimple was alone instead of talking to people. Just use quotation marks. You don't need alternatives.

Dimple, to me, was a likable character. Her confusion over being Indian was something I could relate too. Her character wasn't solid. However, in a story about finding community I think that it is fitting.

Gwyn was really unlikable. I get that the author was trying to give her a more complex/nuanced character but it was unlikable. She was portrayed as unlikable from the start and the only moment you could feel sympathy was when she talked about her past. And honestly, that came too late for me. She seemed rude and a horrible friend through when Dimple needed her and made it seem like a co-dependent relationship on Dimple's side. There wasn't much fallout after (technical spoilers) the big argument.

Parents: Dimple's parents were written well. Their relationship to her was real.

I liked Kavita and I understand that she was supposed to parallel Dimple however she could have had a happier end to her relationship. I enjoyed that we had canon queer characters though and I wish we could have given them a happy ending. I also liked that they talked about how people liking people of the same sex is frowned upon, though I wish it had been discussed further. And also the thing about her cousins wearing her old dresses hurt. Everything hurt. A lot.

I did not like the treatment of a side character. The author clearly did (at the least) research on racism and (most likely) feminism. And yet she gave a character (most like a person of color) a gendered slur and stuff. I would understand if this was because Dimple was a teenager and teenagers do problematic things. But nobody ever called her out and there was nothing to indicate that was wrong.

And Karsh literally had no flaws and romanticized everything.

I can definitely relate to having relatives that don't speak English so you can't communicate well. I enjoyed all of the mentions of Desi food (puris and dosas and laddos and more!). I liked the fact that her parents were (sort of) giving her the choice to marry the guy if she wants to and that her mother refered to American as meaning white. The thing about cultural identity, to me, is spot on and what I needed. A book authored by an Indian American woman for Indian American girls.

A brief moment could be given to discuss the anti-black racism in India and how much of it there is. Especially considering Gandhi and the stuff he pulled regarding that.

What was up about the swimming thing near the end?

And DJ Gulab Jammin' was hilarious to me, sorry.

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Originally published on Tales to Tide You Over

Born Confused is a quintessential teen coming of age novel with boyfriend issues, best friend issues, drinking, drugs, and the whole bit. But at the same time, it’s so much more than that. This novel is about a search for identity.

It’s a walkabout

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as Dimple tries to navigate between her parents’ culture and her own mixed American and Indian (or South Asian as presented in the book) culture. Add that into the mix of high school trauma where she is one of two Indians, the other of whom is Sikh. Then toss in a best friend from childhood who is the high school dream with her blond hair and perfect form, and you get a very complicated, deep novel that explores culture clash on several levels between India and the US, high school and college, and even suburbia and New York City.

This book had me hooked from the beginning with the culture clash, but had someone described it to me, I might have turned away which would have been a real pity. The style is almost stream of consciousness, the comfort of the traditional narrative voice stripped away such that even dialogue is given another typesetting to remind us that everything is filtered through Dimple’s perspective. This is crucial later in the book where we (along with Dimple) realize that what she’s taken as a given is not, and her inability to see beyond that surface has consequences.

The filter effect is supported metaphorically throughout because she has a natural talent with photography. She’s more comfortably behind the camera lens, recording rather than experiencing her life. A creative pursuit is a wonderful way to expose the heart of a character, but in Born Confused, the camera acts more as a distancing effect for Dimple until she has a breakdown/breakthrough and goes out to discover her soul.

This book gave me everything I was hoping for in the book I reviewed last week and more. It looks into the heart of the teen experience, but more than that, it explores the added complication of first and second-generation immigrants. The novel does not hesitate to touch on the hard topics of losing a beloved family member (her grandfather dies before the book starts but it has a big impact) and the discovery that parents are people too with as much complexity and confusion.

I could talk about how lost Dimple is, about how she both wants to embrace and reject her heritage, about how her best friend appropriates all that is her in a weird situation that’s much more complicated than it seems, or any of a half a dozen events that bring us through the novel. Dimple is not all knowing. She does stupid things as often as brilliant, she’s the victim at times, and has to learn how to take control of her life. Always there is the camera and how her pictures act as a metaphor for her understanding, moving from black and white to color to comprehension.

As I said in the beginning, this is the quintessential teen novel. At the same time, it has broader implications regarding self-identification, acceptance of others, and so many other important aspects of growth that people struggle with at any age. It’s a powerful read, and well worth it, no matter what your age.

P.S. I received this title from the publisher through NetGalley in return for an honest review.

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Loved it. It combined the feeling of not-belonging because the protag is an "American Born Confused Desi" with the pure emotions of being a teenager and searching for something. There was a lot of good stuff about cultural appropriation and identity, and some gorgeous, gorgeous, poetic prose.

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There's a sequel out that I'm looking to get my hands on soon.

(Provided by publisher)

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I would like to thank NetGalley and Push for granting me the opportunity to read ebook in exchange for an honest review. Though I received this e-book for free that in no way impacts my review. I give this book 3.5 stars, but only 3 stars in review (as only whole numbers are accepted) until I see

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if the typographical errors are corrected in the finished copy from Push.

Tanuja Desai Hidier's fantastically acclaimed cross-cultural debut comes to PUSH!

Dimple Lala doesn't know what to think. Her parents are from India, and she's spent her whole life resisting their traditions. Then suddenly she gets to high school and everything Indian is trendy. To make matters worse, her parents arrange for her to meet a "suitable boy." Of course it doesn't go well -- until Dimple goes to a club and finds him spinning a magical web . Suddenly the suitable boy is suitable because of his sheer unsuitability. Complications ensue. This is a funny, thoughtful story about finding your heart, finding your culture, and finding your place in America.

What I like About This Story:

This is a lovely story about figuring out who you are, or at least the first solid steps, since we continually evolve throughout our lives. Dimple's best friend is her opposite in most ways. Gwyn is tall, thin, with blond hair and blue eyes. She is the American ideal. And to top it off she has the personality to match, outgoing, bubbly, open, engaging, effervescent. In short Dimple thinks Gwyn is incandescent, the bees-knees, the sunshine under which she flourishes. Dimple considers herself to be a wallflower, as she never seems to know what to say, or what to wear for that matter. It doesn't help her already stunted self-esteem that she has womanly curves. Not slightly curves, but all-out hourglass curves. And when she looks around she sees white girls that are tall and thin, thin, thin. So she is constantly comparing herself to Gwyn and others like her and coming up short, so to speak. She doesn't feel like an American, but she doesn't feel like an Indian either, so she feels as if there is no place she fits.

Dimple is sweet and wholesome. Her character is so naive that it's to the point of almost being too over the top. But she has a good heart. Once her blinders start coming off she becomes an even more enjoyable character. It takes her looking outside her own messy feelings to get the beginning of a grasp on the similarities between all people, regardless of ethnicity, body type, skin/hair/eye color - underneath we all have a heart, a pair of lungs, muscles, teeth, bones, etc. Even Dimple's cousin and parents show insecurities that sail right over her oblivious head.

On the surface Gwyn is a good foil for Dimple, demonstrating that no matter what your exterior looks like you can still feel you are never _fill in the blank_ enough. Yet each girl is so wrapped up in their own internal insecurities they are blind to the fact that everyone else is going through the same thing at some level. Neither girl recognizes that they are envious of one another. Eventually things come to a head and the two girls finally let out some of their frustration, anger, and accumulated slights that they attribute to the other. This serves to illustrate how bad it is to keep your feelings bottled up, yet it also shows that you will survive airing things out with the party causing them, even if it means risking permanent damage to the relationship.

Karsh, Kavita, and Zara Thustra (who can resist a character named after part of the title of a Friedrich Neitzchie book?), are all great characters. Each help Dimple find herself in one manner or another. And each is also flawed to some degree, some more than others.

A series of events happen that make Dimple finally look around, really pay attention to the world and people in her sphere. This in turn leads to a cascade of mini-epiphanies almost daily, and with each one another piece of her life falls into a more comfortable relationship with the rest of her. Suddenly she discovers connections where she'd never before noticed them, opening up her eyes to her own personal growth as well as the growth of those around her. Growth and changes that are not solely limited to her age group either.

What Didn't Work For Me:

While I loved Dimple's devotion to Gwyn, I felt that the relationship was very unbalanced. It frequently felt as if Gwyn was simply taking advantage of Dimple - "borrowing" and of her clothes that she liked, doing the same with Dimple's jewelry, even going so far as to try to appropriate her very culture and 'be more Indian.' It often seemed that is was all about Gwyn, and she only contacted Dimple when she needed something. Though this behavior is explained, somewhat, that still didn't seem to justify her treatment of such a loyal friend.

Conversely I wanted Dimple to wake up and smell the coffee. It astounded me how she let Gwyn walk all over her. If she did get frustrated she stuffed it down deep and went right back to basking in the glow that was Gwyn. Dimple was clearly partly to blame for Gwyn's treatment of her.

Although Karsh was wonderful I was a wee bit disappointed that the story was set up so that Dimple's happiness hinged on "getting her man." That's not to say she didn't grow by leaps and bounds in other ways, but giving another person so much power over her happiness seemed to defeat the purpose.

My final pet peeve was two-fold: the frequent use of non-English words that were not explained or made clear by the context they were used in, and the tremendous amount of typos. One can only hope the typos are restricted to the ebook and not the print version. Plus, this is an advance release copy, so hopefully all the typographical errors will be cleaned up before the release of the final product.

Overall Impression:

A wonderful, meaningful story about coming to terms with growing up. The fact that the lessons weren't restricted to just one age group or ethnicity was a very nice bonus, as it helped demonstrate that we all struggle with many of the same
issues. They may not be exactly the same, but odds of finding someone who isn't going through the same thing, or went through it, are slim to none. There are some sections where Ms. Tanuja Desai Hidier crafted some remarkable phrases, creating absolutely vivid images that made the entire book come to life. One such example is as follows -
History wasn't that easy a thing to learn, seemed to be what I was learning. It wasn't a static story about dead people. It was a revolving door fraught with ghosts still straining to tell their version and turn your head, multifaceted and blinding as a cut diamond.
All in all I found this to be a great teaching book, without feeling like you are being preached to or deliberately taught any lessons. I would certainly recommend this book for high school libraries (not middle school due to some discussions about sex, as well as underage drinking and an incident of drug use).

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Born Confused
(Born Confused #1)
by
Tanuja Desai Hidier


I am not sure why I picked this book up (except I liked the cover). I did not know it was YA and while it had the topics of YA, it did not really read like one. The dialogue and way topics were covered were well-written.
I enjoyed learning parts

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of the Indian culture and to get inside the head of a young Indian American.
The characters were also well-done. The best friend (Gwyn) of the main character (Dimple) is a obnoxious jerk that does not appreciate Dimple. While this can be overdone in YA, it is important because flaws make a character realistic. And in the end Ms. Hidier does a good job of handling the relationship between the two.

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