The design and UX isn't done, Rob and Abbie, okkurrrr! 😌
kelly_e's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
informative
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Title: Honor
Author: Thrity Umrigar
Genre: Fiction
Rating: 4.50
Pub Date: January 4, 2022
T H R E E • W O R D S
Immersive • Profound • Unforgettable
📖 S Y N O P S I S
Indian American journalist Smita has returned to India to cover a story, but reluctantly: long ago she and her family left the country with no intention of ever coming back. As she follows the case of Meena—a Hindu woman attacked by members of her own village and her own family for marrying a Muslim man—Smita comes face to face with a society where tradition carries more weight than one’s own heart, and a story that threatens to unearth the painful secrets of Smita’s own past. While Meena’s fate hangs in the balance, Smita tries in every way she can to right the scales. She also finds herself increasingly drawn to Mohan, an Indian man she meets while on assignment. But the dual love stories of Honor are as different as the cultures of Meena and Smita themselves: Smita realizes she has the freedom to enter into a casual affair, knowing she can decide later how much it means to her.
💠T H O U G H T S
When Honor was announced as a Reese's pick for January 2022 it immediately caught my attention. After reading the synopsis, I was certain it was one of her picks that I would jive with. As the year went on I heard some really good things about it, but it took me until late 2023 to finally get my hands on a copy.
I was 100% invested, not bring able to put this book down, and reading it in its entirety in one sitting. It is heartbreakingly beautiful and complex. Yet despite all of the pain, it remains a story of enduring love and hope. Through her prose, Thrity brings into focus so many dichotomies (hate and love, oppression and privilege), intertwining comparisons between the western world and rural India. We get a look into two very different women. Meena's story is absolutely devastating, and I wanted to know Smita's family story for escaping India.
Oh but, it was really the last 'book' which dug itself into my mind. The graphic depictions of caste hierarchies, cultural conservatism, misogyny, public shaming, torture that continue to be the reality faced by so many to this day was deeply unsettling to read. It filled me with sadness. It filled me with rage. It filled me with empathy. It made me question humanity. I read a physical copy while listening to the audio, and this created a completely immersive experience.
My one quibble would be how it ended. I think Smita and Mohan's future would've been better left open-ended. Offering an answer reminded me of society's inability to sit with uncomfortableness. And in doing so it took away from the power of what came before.
Every now and then there is a book that touches me in ways I am not anticipating. Honor was one of those books. It shines a light on India's humanitarian crisis. Some of the hard-hitting and disturbing scenes will forever be etched into my memory. It is certainly the type of book you need to be in the right frame of mind for. I am definitely interested in exploring Thrity's backlist and picking up her 2023 release as well.
📚 R E C O M M E N D • T O
• readers who like realistic fiction
• anyone looking for memorable female protagonists
• bookclubs
🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S
"Sometimes, it seemed to Smita that the history of the world was written in female blood."
"As children, we were taught to be afraid of tigers and lions. Nobody taught us what I know today - the most dangerous animal in this world is a man with wounded pride."Â
Author: Thrity Umrigar
Genre: Fiction
Rating: 4.50
Pub Date: January 4, 2022
T H R E E • W O R D S
Immersive • Profound • Unforgettable
📖 S Y N O P S I S
Indian American journalist Smita has returned to India to cover a story, but reluctantly: long ago she and her family left the country with no intention of ever coming back. As she follows the case of Meena—a Hindu woman attacked by members of her own village and her own family for marrying a Muslim man—Smita comes face to face with a society where tradition carries more weight than one’s own heart, and a story that threatens to unearth the painful secrets of Smita’s own past. While Meena’s fate hangs in the balance, Smita tries in every way she can to right the scales. She also finds herself increasingly drawn to Mohan, an Indian man she meets while on assignment. But the dual love stories of Honor are as different as the cultures of Meena and Smita themselves: Smita realizes she has the freedom to enter into a casual affair, knowing she can decide later how much it means to her.
💠T H O U G H T S
When Honor was announced as a Reese's pick for January 2022 it immediately caught my attention. After reading the synopsis, I was certain it was one of her picks that I would jive with. As the year went on I heard some really good things about it, but it took me until late 2023 to finally get my hands on a copy.
I was 100% invested, not bring able to put this book down, and reading it in its entirety in one sitting. It is heartbreakingly beautiful and complex. Yet despite all of the pain, it remains a story of enduring love and hope. Through her prose, Thrity brings into focus so many dichotomies (hate and love, oppression and privilege), intertwining comparisons between the western world and rural India. We get a look into two very different women. Meena's story is absolutely devastating, and I wanted to know Smita's family story for escaping India.
Oh but, it was really the last 'book' which dug itself into my mind. The graphic depictions of caste hierarchies, cultural conservatism, misogyny, public shaming, torture that continue to be the reality faced by so many to this day was deeply unsettling to read. It filled me with sadness. It filled me with rage. It filled me with empathy. It made me question humanity. I read a physical copy while listening to the audio, and this created a completely immersive experience.
My one quibble would be how it ended. I think Smita and Mohan's future would've been better left open-ended. Offering an answer reminded me of society's inability to sit with uncomfortableness. And in doing so it took away from the power of what came before.
Every now and then there is a book that touches me in ways I am not anticipating. Honor was one of those books. It shines a light on India's humanitarian crisis. Some of the hard-hitting and disturbing scenes will forever be etched into my memory. It is certainly the type of book you need to be in the right frame of mind for. I am definitely interested in exploring Thrity's backlist and picking up her 2023 release as well.
📚 R E C O M M E N D • T O
• readers who like realistic fiction
• anyone looking for memorable female protagonists
• bookclubs
🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S
"Sometimes, it seemed to Smita that the history of the world was written in female blood."
"As children, we were taught to be afraid of tigers and lions. Nobody taught us what I know today - the most dangerous animal in this world is a man with wounded pride."Â
Content Warnings
Graphic: Classism, Sexism, Murder, Violence, Torture, Death, Grief, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Islamophobia, Religious bigotry, Physical abuse, Xenophobia, Racism, and Misogyny
Moderate: Racial slurs, Sexual violence, Emotional abuse, Domestic abuse, and Child abuse
Minor: Cancer, Death of parent, and Cursing
death of partner, mutilation, povertywoolgatherer's review
challenging
dark
emotional
medium-paced
3.75
I had a lot of mixed feelings about this novel, though I wouldn’t necessarily say it was bad. To start with the good, while not perfectly executed, I really appreciated how Umrigar approached the nuances of privilege and its relationship to intersections of identity in India; how one navigates different spaces and conversations will heavily depend on one’s class, race, gender, religion, and nationality. This was especially explored through the protagonist, Smita, who is a relatively well-off Indian American Hindu woman in her motherland as a journalist.
All of this comes about through an in-depth look into religious conflict between Hindus and Muslims in India and the consequences that come with it. This is explored through a literal legal case in the book of a Hindu woman, Meena, who was violently attacked by her village for marrying a Muslim man, and the book’s primary focus becomes a push to get justice for her, which is all being documented by Smita. However, there was this indifferent yet voyeuristic perspective that felt a little off-putting, as it spun grief and trauma into a kind of sensational story that, frankly, I thought became more in-your-face due to it being presented as a legal case. In a way, there was some self-awareness of this perspective through the conflicted feelings Smita has of being back in India.
I think because of the way the book was framed, it led to me wanting more details about Meena’s case, and we sometimes get that from chapters that told her story from her perspective. There was a lot left to be desired with how the case come to an end, though. It also felt like Umrigar set aside Meena’s situation to focus more on the budding romance between Smita and her companion, Mohan. And, I won’t lie, it really rubbed me the wrong way how this explicitly came about.
Overall, I think there were a lot of complex ideas presented throughout Honor that made it hard to parse out how I felt about this book. I can’t help but wonder how different the book would be if it was framed differently and not through the eyes of a journalist.Â
Content Warnings
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Hate crime, Grief, Misogyny, Religious bigotry, Islamophobia, Murder, and Death
Moderate: Sexual assault
Minor: Racism and Cancer
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