Book Review: "Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows" by Balli Kaur Jaswal

Hi Steemians,

I'm here today to share with you book I literally just finished reading. As the title of this post suggests, the book is called Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows, written by Balli Kaur Jaswal. And yes, it is as fun and unique as it sounds.

(picture credit: Goodreads)

This story follows a young punjabi woman named Nikki who lives in London and is what she calls herself a "modern woman". Her mother and sister both are much more conservative than her and especially her mother has never been very supportive of her life decisions - such as moving out, dropping out of law school and taking a job at a bar. She's also an activist and a feminist.
Nikki's sister Mindi is very different from her - even though she's the older one she still lives with their mother and actually wants to have an arranged marriage; something that would be completely out of the question for Nikki.
One day, Mindi asks Nikki to post a sort of "marriage ad" for her in the Punjabi community centre in Southall. When there, Nikki sees a sign about a job offer for teaching a writing workshop at the centre. Kulwinder, who works at the centre, isn't very impressed with Nikki when she comes in for the interview but since she's the only applicant, Nikki ends up getting the job.
Nikki is quite taken aback when she finds out the workshop is actually targeted at older Punjabi women (mostly widows) who are completely illiterate. She's even more surprised when it turns out they're not even that interested in learning English - they mainly just want to tell stories: of the erotic kind.

Set to the very unique and new to me backdrop of the Punjabi community in Southall, London, I found this book to be loveable, quirky and fun, with a dark twist to it as the story progresses. The premise is obviously quite out there and I did feel like the story turned a little bit unrealistic at times, particularly in the way these obviously very conservative women were so openly sharing things about their private sexual lives without really seeming to find this inappropriate at all.
I still enjoyed the humour of this book and the fact that the author manages to keep it lighthearted while discussing some more serious issues as well, such as honour-crimes in conservative communities, racism, sexism, and the situation of older women that have essentially become invisible to society.

While not quite missing out on ticking a few cliché boxes, Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows was definitely and interesting and fun read that I definitely recommend everyone to at least take a closer look at.