Wednesday, July 20, 2016

A House for Happy MothersA House for Happy Mothers by Amulya Malladi
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is an emotional compelling story that just made me keep on flipping the pages to see how it played out in the end.

The book is trying to portray the surrogacy industry that is rising in India, and contrary to the title of the book, there are no "happy mothers" that live in this place; because it describes all of the shabby conditions that they were living in and how blackmailed and monitored they were. Not only do you deeply feel for both main protagonists, but this book also evoked an emotional response from it. I felt empathy towards both sides of the table, and I could honestly appreciate how Malladi connected their lives.

Throughout the whole story, at least from my perspective I was appalled to see the demonstrated a women's unwilling exploitation of "renting" their body, which was something that I was completely unaware of going into it.

One half of the story follows Priya, a half-Indian Californian that has everything that she wants, except a child. She's what her husband, Madhu, calls "baby crazy" because she will do almost anything to get a baby as an addition to her family. Asha has a brilliant high IQ son, but she can't afford to send him to a boarding school with the high education that she wants. I absolutely hated how her husband Pratap used her and manipulated her, it literally disgusted me and I think that's why I can't give this a full 5*.

My favorite character who deserved 100% of my empathy is Priya, because although I couldn't understand what place she is in life, I was cheering for her as an individual. I really appreciate how diverse Indian culture the author put into; I can tell that it's well-researched. I would highly recommend for anyone to pick this book up, it's a short-read and the ending will leave you satisfied.

*Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange to a honest review.*

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