Book Review : The Crossover Year

★ Avoid ★★ No Great Loss ★★★ Worth Reading ★★★★ Close to Masterpiece ★★★★★ Masterpiece

Name: The Crossover Year by Bhargavi Balachandran
Genre: Fiction Language: English Pages: 288
Published: 2013
My Rating: ★★★
Started: 5th July, 2014 Completed: 21st July, 2014
Total Reading Hour: 40 Hrs

Excerpt from Book:
Meet Sri Anuprabha, aka Anu, a twenty-nine year-old banker who is terrified of entering her thirties. She dreams of quitting her job at the bank, sporting yoga pants and traipsing around the world. Her world turns upside down when things go awry and she is faced with the prospect of spending her days watching Tamil serials. She comes up with a five-point plan for reclaiming her life back before she hits the big 30. But things are never as simple as drawing up a flowchart in real life, are they? Especially with a ghastly recession rearing its ugly head…. Anu bumbles through the corridors of domesticity and travels on a funfilled roller coaster ride in a bid to discover her passion in life.Along the way, she meets new people, experiences crazy new things and learns some hard lessons in marriage, friendship, parenting and life. The Crossover Year is a funny, yet heartwarming story of a woman in search of her identity, and a chronicle of her hilarious quest for discovering her inner mojo. Bring out a platter of cookies and a steaming mug of chai, and join Anu on the ride of her lifetime.

As title “The Crossover Year” describes itself, It is a story about all the changes and transformations which takes place in Anu’s life over a year. Story gave me smile on very first two pages and then story start transforming from one event to another event. Protagonist Anuprabha is a 29 years old banker with engineering and MBA degree. The story starts with her desire to quit her job. After some twist-turns and meandering events, she gets rid of her job but all at the wrong hour as the demon of recession has a strong hold in market and Anu has no choice but to get hooked to Tamil serials at home. In meantime, She joins a funky gym called the Pink Panther Gym and try to streamlines her career options in world of poems. Every chapter in book brings more and more freshness.

This one is not another chic-lit with full of love and sex, but it’s so light-humorous and full of fun. Author didn’t develop many characters and concluded all in last chapter but still it’s enjoyable. Most enjoyable parts of book are mail communication between Anu and her friend Jimmy. This is a perfect travel novel or novel-over-coffee.

Note: I received a copy of book from author.

About Author:
Bhargavi Balachandran completed her MBA from TAPMI, Manipal and held several corporate jobs.She used to have a day job analyzing balance sheets once, but traded that in for the privilege of working from home in her pyjamas and running behind a lil’ imp. Her first book Seven Across, a romance novella was published in 2012. Her second book, The Crossover Year was published in Dec 2013. She co-founded a portal http://www.paisleybay.com in 2012 and is a book addict, lover of arts and a mom.