Title : The Indian Tycoon’s Marriage Deal
Author : Adite Banerjie
Genre : Romance
Publish Date : September 1st, 2013
Publisher : Harlequin
Source : Author
Rating : 3.5/5

It’s been a really long time since I’ve read Mills & Boons. If you know not what these are, they are romances where the men are standard TDH (Tall Dark Handsome) and the women pretty and feisty. The twain meet. Sparks fly. The End is pre-ordained. You read the book for The How.

As I remember this genre, the women were generally blonde and blue-eyed and the men arrogant and handsome. The one thing they definitely were was NOT Indian. So I looked forward to reading an M&B set in India, in Delhi no less! The guy here is “tall, suave and superstar-handsome” Krish Dev, son of hard-nosed tycoon KD, and heir to a very large business empire. The girl is feisty working-girl, landscaper Maya Shome. Maya is an orphan, with only memories of her loving parents to comfort her. He seeks a way to counter his domineering Dad’s plans, and she seeks revenge. He offers her a deal she can’t refuse, and it looks like they both might get what they want . . .

The plot works nicely – I can quite see this as a Bollywood film – and the book keeps chugging away with bits of intrigue mingled with romantic encounters of the desi kind. Krish is an impressive hero and Maya an equally interesting heroine. He calls her “Jaaneman” and blows hot and cold by turns. Lovely Maya must work very hard to resist the charmer. As befits an Indian setting, there are the parental units and their emotional pull, the villain, the vamp and the long-suffering mother. There are also descriptions of tycoon-ish opulence, desi food, dress and customs.

Banerjie’s writing is smooth. She does descriptions well, and we get a pretty good feel for the characters and the locales. I will say that at the beginning of the book, there is a lot of “telling” (as compared to “showing”) going on as Banerjie races to fill us in on all the back-story, but that was the only negative aspect I could discern. Both Krish and Maya are very like-able characters, and Banerjie gives the pair a searing chemistry. I thought the romance very well done, and the love-making scene fairly tastefully described, given desi sensibilities.

This book was a quick entertaining read. I’d recommend it for a lazy day at the beach, or as a warm read for a dreary winter’s day. Do pick this one up, ladies; it is exactly what the doctor ordered.