Book Review: Book explores life at intersection of generations and cultures

Yasmin is used to keeping her family separate from the rest of her life, it’s safer that way. Her Indian parents still seem so different, even after years of living in London, and Yasmin’s bank of embarrassing memories is well stocked.

But now that she’s engaged to Joe – charming, beautiful Joe – there’s a reasonable expectation that their families are going to meet. After all, they are going to be related.

Joe’s feminist mother is so stylish and clever, so welcoming, but she’s also prone to taking Joe for granted, in a way that can sometimes seem a bit, well, overbearing.

Monica Ali does a great job of engaging us with the masterclass in negotiation required for building relationships within and between families.

Because everyone’s got their issues and like it or not, they’re going to show up somehow.

Love Marriage explores life at the intersection of generations and cultures, following many paths of possibility towards a variety of happy endings.

Yasmin and Joe are at the heart of the story, but this is a tale of family dynamics and the changes that occur when there’s disruption in the system.

By bringing their families together, Yasmin and Joe are causing quite a stir.

Through layers of stories told from different points of view, we’re given insight to the impact of family expectations and societal pressures on the individual.

The different perspectives are what make the story so rich; in many ways it’s the characters surrounding Yasmin and Joe who are the real stars in this novel.

As home truths emerge, changing the past as well as the future, Yasmin finds herself questioning some of her core assumptions about who she is and what’s important to her. But the negotiations can’t go on forever. At some point choices are going to have to be made.

Love Marriage is a chunky, funny, moving, well-paced book.

It’s romantic in many ways, but not to the extent that everything’s got be tidied away too neatly at the end. There’s a satisfying sense of the messiness of relationships and the many ways they shape us.