Splendid, vividly compelling. This has been an unforgettable read! It kept me up all night, it was that good. Definitely recommending it to my closed ones.

With the name of my blog being The Lotus Readers, this was one I really had to read. The poetic meaning of the lotus flower is that even out of the muddiest water, something beautiful can grow, I use it as the symbol of my counselling business, because it’s a symbol of renewal and that’s how it’s used here. Our heroine Tara, has been in an arranged marriage to Sanjay for three years when they move to the southern states of America. Isolated and without her family, she feels lonely and is often neglected and even abused by her husband. With so much time on her hands, her mind starts to drift back to the abandonment she felt in childhood, Her parents left India for a new life in Dubai, taking her brother. Tara was left in Mangalore with her grandparents and mentally ill uncle, These circumstances mirror how she feels now and when she develops a connection with some people locally she confides in them about her marriage. Even though they’re relative strangers, they offer help, and Tara accepts. Sadly, her patriarchal family think she should accept her circumstances

Tara discovers self worth and the courage to break free without their approval. She starts to rebuild her life and even meets an old love from her childhood, Cyrus. As always, with events we don’t process and make peace with, the old fears and worries resurface for her. The victim shaming from her family has only been lying dormant. Will she be able to do this, for the sake of her relationship with Cyrus and their future together?

The writing is gorgeous, intimate and incredibly sensual. I felt I knew Tara inside out. The book is so emotionally literate and it gave me the same joy I get when a client comes to a realisation and starts to change their life for the better. Tara is much stronger than she knows, it’s hard to overcome those childhood demons, but when she does it is glorious. This is truly a beautiful read, uplifting, relatable and exceptionally honest. Loved it.

This was a solid read about an Indian woman from Mangalore who finds herself in an arranged marriage, living in Atlanta, GA, and struggling to find personal freedom. There are memoir-ish vibes to the writing and Tara’s journey of self reckoning and self discovery is strong. And genuinely just appreciate seeing Indian women writing novels.

The writing could’ve been much stronger. A lot of telling, the plot sort of stumbles along. Still, I found myself turning the page and curious to see how things would turn out.

I enjoyed this book very much. The narrative is very powerful, and it was satisfying to watch Tara find herself and build a nurturing network of friends and chosen family. Obviously, many trigger warnings for physical, emotional, and verbal abuse and sexual assault apply.

Tara moves to Atlanta for an arranged marriage and slowly extricates herself from her unhappy situation with the help of her network of found friends, also recent immigrants. The focus of the narrative revolves around the positive network of friendships in my opinion, and I appreciated that. Tara does find a positive romantic relationship, but that's the icing on her happiness. Would recommend.

A purple lotus is a symbol of rebirth and this novel lives up to that name. It is the story of a rebirth of an Indian woman who battles through cultural expectations to become her own person. Tara grew up in India and was often left alone. Her parents moved to Dubai when she was young and left her with an uncle who had issues. She ended up turning to books for emotional support. As an adult, Tara is betrothed to an Indian-American who after marrying her returns to the States leaving her behind in India for 3 years alone. Once he finally has her move to America she finds her self still emotionally alone. Her husband, Sanjay, doesn't express any affection for her and often leaves her alone while he stays late at work. Tara starts making some friends and earning her own money and find out more about herself. She suffers from emotional and physical abuse at the hands of her husband. Her family pressures her to stay but Tara feels like she should follow her own heart & spirit.

This was story about Tara overcoming her family's expectations that she be a submissive wife to her husband and just go with things. They are seemingly more concerned about reputation than they are about their daughter's happiness and well-being. This was a tough read at times but Tara was a great protagonist who carved her own path. I enjoyed this read and look forward to more from the author.

This harrowing story follows Tara, an Indian woman who has moved to Atlanta to be with her new husband. Their marriage was arranged and she had only met him a few times before marrying. She hopes she is entering into a loving marriage but she finds herself completely ignored in her new home. Tara is incredibly lonely but brave, and she finds a way to forge her own life in this new country.
This book instantly gripped me. I felt deeply for Tara and the many different hardship she had to endure. This is ultimately a tale about the strength of women. I thought the story got a little slow towards the middle. Regardless, I thoroughly enjoyed it and highly recommend it.

Link to the review posted on my blog: https://thewordglutton.wordpress.com/2020/09/29/purple-lotus-by-veena-rao-review-and-thoughts/

Purple Lotus is an engrossing tale with themes of loss, love, the power of kindness, family values (specifically Indian), and believing in one’s self. It also briefly touches upon the topic of Schizophrenia and how (badly) our society handles mental illnesses. I read the whole book in under 10 hours (that’s like really fast for me 😂) because I could not put it down.

As you may have gathered from the blurb, Purple Lotus is about Tara, who is pressured by her parents into getting married to a stranger through an arranged match. At 28, it’s already too late for her, they say. Her parents are facing pressure from the community to marry their daughter off and the pressure falls onto Tara eventually, who gives in and marries Sanjay. Sanjay, however, is an asshole neglects to arrange for Tara to go live with him in the US, for three years with no explanation whatsoever. This is until he randomly emails her one day and Tara is expected to drop everything and run to him, because that’s what dutiful Indian wives do. There begins a traumatic and abusive marriage that’s made even more difficult by the expectations of a patriarchal society.

The whole concept of arranged marriage hit close to home for me. Too close for comfort, tbh. Purple Lotus perfectly captures the essence of how arranged marriages work in a patriarchal society and how it is often shrouded in pressure and shame, always on the woman’s side of the family. Always. I’m not saying arranged marriages are bad or they’re doomed, not at all. But it’s undeniable that the core concept of it is extremely patriarchal, casteist, and sexist in nature.

Tara’s anxieties and her inner turmoil came through effectively through the pages. She is not unfamiliar with neglect, thanks to her parents. But it hits her harder when marital neglect escalates to physical and emotional abuse. Even as her kind American friends encourage her to take the obvious course of action, she is conflicted about what her parents would say, what her community would say, etc. Predictably enough, her parents are dead against her getting a divorce and remind her often that it’s on her to make this marriage work. “Laying guilt came so naturally to Amma,” relates Tara at one juncture.

I really liked how the author handled the portrayal of Tara’s parents. The monumental role they play in the tiniest decisions Tara has to make in her life for herself, the way Tara’s mother guilt trips her and resorts to victim shaming every time she tries to steer away from the tried and tested Indian way of life, and so on. The narrative switches between Tara’s childhood and her present in a way it gives a complete picture of Tara’s life so far; it makes it easier to understand and empathize with her. In fact, looking back now, Tara feels like an old friend rather than a character in a book.

There were pacing issues in the second half of the book, I felt like it noticeably slowed down after 70% or so. Maybe because there were a lot of happenings crammed in there, the narrative’s focus shifted from Tara’s thought process and went on to “tell” the reader what was happening. It was slow but not to an extent it got unreadable. One of this book’s undeniable strengths is that it’s very readable.

A couple of other things that bothered me were some casteist statements and the treatment of the only Muslim character in the book. I have expanded upon this on my blog.

This novel explores arranged marriages, India tradition and coming to America. Our main character faces abuse and abandonment but the author does not convey the emotion of such treatment. Going further would have made it more of a success story. Description of foods and places a highlight. I love this publisher.

Copy provided by the publisher and NetGalley

Purple Lotus is a novel written with a lot of heart. It addresses several powerful themes such as prejudice, acceptance, conditional love from parents, and more.

Rao's debut novel, Purple Lotus, has a lot of good story in it. Unfortunately for me, the execution did not meet the high bar raised by the plot. Purple Lotus is about recovery from abuse, about Indian family values, about how we project our past experiences over how we think others will respond to our actions.

Rao really does a fantastic job of writing what it is like to be living in a situation of emotional abuse. Throughout the first half of the book, I felt like I was there with Tara, feeling my options becoming more and more limited. I was worrying about what to cook my no-good husband for dinner when he was around. I was worrying about what my family would think of our relationship and how they would get along with him. I was worrying about his reaction to me buying thrift store coats.

But then halfway through the story, there is a shift. Tara leaves her husband to become more independent and regain her feelings of self worth. Unfortunately, this is when the writing shifts and I felt I was no longer in the story. Now I'm an observer, a fly on the wall, watching this story as though it is a time lapse through the rest of her life. The story never lingers for long in one place, instead moving forward at irregular intervals, but also never skipping over much. Instead huge swaths of time are condensed into one or two paragraphs, which left the story feeling like a very different book than the one I had started. Suddenly, I looked up from my reading and realized I didn't like any of the characters anymore.

What Rao is trying to do at this point is a very difficult thing to do, which is to unpack the emotional abuse and trauma with her characters. She had been showing us the effects up until this point, now she was attempting to help them recover while they were still experiencing the after-effects. In attempting to convey the experience of trauma, there were often over-explained/over-exaggerating sections about emotions. This over-exaggeration in turn made the characters seem a bit childish, in a way that threw me off from the rest of the story. Now I found myself no longer reading for the journey, but reading just to see the outcome in the end.

This book in an inspiring story about finding your self worth and the courage it takes to face your fears.

This book does an amazing job of showcasing how often times people don’t notice red flags or even realize they’re being abused. While it is abundantly clear to the reader that the way her husband treats her is unacceptable Tara’s thoughts show that she doesn’t think the same way. At one point she is even disappointed that he’s not mad at her because she thinks that means he doesn’t care.

The book also explores what it is like to be a woman in a patriarchal society where the men are valued and the women are picked apart.

We follow Tara on her journey to realizing her self worth and facing her fears in order to gain her personal happiness and the ending was a beautiful tribute to the empowerment of demanding respect.

This is a must read!!

This book pissed me off, but in a good way? Loved Tara, hated Sanjay. Wanted to see SO much goodness for her, and smack the shit out of him.

"Like the purple lotus, rarest of rare, you shall rise from muddy waters to rule the world" -

This is a perfect summary for the book and a beautiful apt title!

Purple lotus is the story of Tara, an Indian immigrant who moves to Atlanta to live with her husband of three years for the first time, where she faces both physical and mental abuse. She fights through her circumstances with real grit and finds her sunshine and self-worth in her life after major struggle. My heart wept for her when she went back to her abusive husband simply because it would make her parents happy and would meet society’s expectations.

Her struggle to stay within societal expectations in a patriarchal society and finding something passionate in her life is depicted beautifully. She develops a support system who were truly godsend as they help her in getting out of the abusive marriage. The book depicts dual timelines - Tara’s present and her past where we find out how Tara was abandoned by her own family when she was only a child. Being abandoned by her husband hits harder as it seems like her past that is repeating for her. Truly, life is a vicious circle as she finds a doll that she lost as a kid now after all these years and it symbolizes her self-discovery in life.

Her husband Sanjay was easily one of the characters that I hated right away and the way he treated his wife is beyond horrible. I wish she had made him pay for all the torture. I loved all the food references as they made me nostalgic for Karnataka. My husband recently introduced me to the ice cream sundae - “gadbad” and being reminded of it, I am seriously craving for it now! On another note, Tara is definitely a character I won’t be able to forget for a long time.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book!

This was a decent read that delves deep into victim-shaming and its presence in Indian culture. I will be the first to admit that I don't know much about Indian culture, which is why I found this OwnVoices perspective eye-opening.

Tara's story is interesting and a bit heartbreaking. She was left behind by her family when she was just a kid so that she would focus on school. They took her younger brother along with them and left the poor girl with extended family. Her parents apparently didn't think much about leaving her with her grandparents and schizophrenic uncle. This same "leftovers" syndrome carries throughout about 50-60% of the book - no men seem to be eager to marry her so she doesn't get married until her 30s, and even then, it's to a guy that doesn't care about her.

I was really interested in Tara's marriage story with Sanjay and I enjoyed how the author highlighted her family's reactions to her marital problems. I kept thinking, "Why doesn't she just leave?!" even before he became abusive, but then I needed to remind myself that this is not my culture and that my values may differ. It's also really hard to break away from lessons that have been taught to you throughout your whole life and only reinforced by the members of your extended community. It's not fair to judge.

Though I liked the cultural lessons woven into the story, I found some of the writing hard to get through. The beginning of the book in particular was overly descriptive and became a bit tedious to get through. And after her first marriage ended, the story dragged on for a bit. I was surprised to find the book is only a little over 300 pages because it felt like a bit of a chore to finish.

Overall, some good stuff in here but the writing made it a bit hard to get through. Could just be a case of an author's writing style not being for me.

Veena Rao’s Purple Lotus is the story of a woman’s growth from submissive—albeit resentful—girl to a self-actualized woman. It’s not much longer than the average novel, but it contains so many years and so much plot that it felt like I dropped into the protagonist’s life as she lived through critical moments. It is a troubling, affecting read that I think will appeal to fans of biographical novels.

Even though its the twenty-first century, Tara’s life is a lot like an Austen novel. She grew up in a comfortably wealthy family of Hindus in Mangalore. She becomes a journalist, but her parents push her to marry. Because she’s in her late 20s, she’s starting to be looked at by her community as a sad spinster. Her parents passed over earlier proposals because Tara’s father refuses to pay a dowry. He calls the practice old-fashioned—not that the rest of their community sees it that way. Tara’s last chance, they believe, is to marry an Indian man who lives in the United States.

When the novel’s setting relocates to the US from Mangalore, Tara starts to reveal the long road of parental neglect and cultural pressure that led her to a bad match. I had to keep hoping that things would get better for Tara. Thankfully, even though things get very dark for her, Tara has a core of steel that she begins to discover. I really like stories about women who find the strength to demand that others treat them with the respect that they deserve. Tara is a good, smart, beautiful woman and, dammit, people need to stop pushing her around.

This novel doesn’t dive as deeply into Hinduism or Mangalore culture as Seven, by Farzana Doctor, delves into Dawoodi culture and religion, unfortunately. But Purple Lotus is definitely a rewarding read—especially since Tara does get a measure of happiness and even payback after a rough life of being ignored, left behind, and scorned.

“The whole of the universe is inside you. To rule yourself is to rule the world.”

Purple Lotus is the story of Tara who is sent from her home in India to live in Atlanta with her stranger of a husband from an arranged marriage. Once Tara arrives in Atlanta, the struggles of her new life remind her of those she faced in her childhood.

Tara’s journey to self empowerment is one that will move you to tears of both sorrow and joy.

This was a great, emotional, and powerful read that is definitely worth your time! A solid 4 stars from me!

A truly moving and life-changing story of a young woman, Tara, from Mangalore, India who finds herself trapped in an arranged marriage with Sanjay. She moves to Atlanta to be with Sanjay, three years after her marriage. Much to her dismay, she is faced with a life of isolation, a loveless marriage, and abuse, bringing back memories of her childhood. At a tender age of 8, Tara is left behind with her aging grandparents while her parents and baby brother move to their new life in Dubai.

We experience how the main character, Tara, who is effortlessly relatable, slowly mature and develops into this strong confident woman. Her journey of self-discovery and her quest for independence is inspiring. It bought tears to my eyes as I experienced her struggles, rejections, and desertion. With fierce determination, she rebuilds her life, and even at the risk of being shunned by her community, she puts her own happiness and future ahead of her and marries her childhood love, Cyrus Saldanha.


Summary: An amazing novel, deeply moving and touching, one of discovery and self-worth. A talented author who keeps one engaged by being real and addresses difficult issues like domestic violence. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this novel, engaging right to the end, highly recommend it.

Growing up in India, Tara loses her sense of self when her parents and younger brother move away. She is left with her grandparents and a schizophrenic uncle to wait for her parent's return. She later marries an Indian who lives in America, but doesn't join him until three years later. It is a disastrous marriage with physical and verbal abuse. She then sets out on her own in order to come to terms with her past and her present.

The writing is engaging and the story is hopeful. Purple Lotus gives readers a typical view of India--arranged marriages, family dishonor, the status of male and female children. I highly recommend it if you enjoy reading about Indian life.

Tara, whose name means Star in English, is an Indian woman caught between the confines and expectations of family and society and her desire to find her own happiness in the world.. After marrying a man who was a suitable match, and moving to US, she finds only loneliness and isolation. Her married life mirrors a childhood full of feeling abandoned and unloved. Her journey of self-discovery and independence is compelling and engaging. I felt for her along this journey. It's fascinating to learn about Indian culture and see how it conflicts with the American lifestyle and values. One can see why a woman from India would be torn between the two worlds.

Thank you to NetGalley and She Writes Press for the opportunity to read this book.

Please note this is a 4.5.

"We're going to bed tonight early, Esther," I say to myself as I open my ARC of this book before I go to bed. "Just going to read about 50 pages to get off to sleep and I'll be done."

This was a lie.

It is not a frequent lie I tell myself, but it's not often that I enjoy a book as much as I enjoyed this one. A sweeping story examining the power of family, love, and the way that a life can be broken and rewoven, there is so much here to put together and take in. The overarching love story, of both Cyrus and Tara and Tara to herself, is wonderful. The themes of domestic violence and the pervasiveness of PTSD are really important themes, and I loved the relationship that Tara finds with her eventual friends even in the strange world of America.

I am so glad that the book ended the way it did- there was so much beauty in here, and I really, really wanted a happy ending. I think my heart would have shattered if the book had ended any other way, but this book left me feeling full. And I won't even begrudge it keeping me up until 2 in the morning to finish it off.