Louisiana Catch by Sweta Srivastava Vikram

Louisiana Catch by Sweta Srivastava Vikram

Modern History Press

Ann Arbor, MI

April 10, 2018

251 pages

From the publisher:

Ahana, a wealthy thirty-three-year-old New Delhi woman, flees the pain of her mother’s death, and her dark past, by accepting a huge project in New Orleans, where she’ll coördinate an annual conference to raise awareness of violence against women. Her half-Indian, half-Irish colleague and public relations guru, Rohan Brady, who helps Ahana develop her online presence, offends her prim sensibilities with his raunchy humor. She is convinced that he’s a womanizer.

Meanwhile, she seeks relief from her pain in an online support group, where she makes a good friend: the mercurial Jay Dubois, who is also grieving the loss of his mother. Louisiana Catch is an emotionally immersive novel about identity, shame, and who we project ourselves to be in the world. It’s a book about Ahana’s unreliable instincts and her ongoing battle to decide whom to place her trust in as she, Rohan, and Jay shed layers of their identities.

My thoughts on the novel:

The soon-to-be-released novel by Sveta Srivastava Vikram, Louisiana Catch, left me in a review quandary as I found this to be a very frustrating novel. The book was by no means terrible enough for me to want to stop reading, but was not wonderful enough for a gushing review. I was not very sympathetic to the main character, Ahana, a young Indian divorcée. For an upper caste young woman in modern India who had traveled to America to see relatives many times, she seemed oddly naïve to me, regardless of some of the blurbs I read about the book. Yes, her parents had sheltered her and she was somewhat of a loner, but she seemed her own worse enemy. Unfortunately, this was the second book I have read about spousal rape, as Ahana had been in a very abusive marriage. For her mother to suffer from a congenital heart condition kept hidden from the family and to suddenly pass away was tragic for Ahana.

Ahana did have enough chutzpah to decide to organize and want to be the spokesperson for a women’s conference called No Excuse, timely in light of the #metoo  and #timesup movements. Ahana, at the urging of her psychotherapist cousin, joins an online therapy group for people who have suffered great losses. She and one of the men in the group, Jay, had both lost their mothers. At the same time Ahana met Rohan, a marketer who was assigned to work with her on publicizing the conference. As a social media neophyte, Ahana had trouble setting boundaries and then she decided to play detective concerning Jay.

Eventually, Ahana had to work in both New York and New Orleans. She became friends with the gorgeous Rohan (who also happened to be half-Indian). Seeming to be somewhat of a playboy to Ahana, she kept Rohan at arm’s length.

Between Jay and Rohan, which of these two guys might be the better “catch”? What did Ahana get herself caught up in working out her personal problems as well as her work problems?

I did like the cautionary tale aspect of the book regarding social media. I know I have been extremely careless when I was first on social media and since the platforms are always changing, you must be diligent in monitoring your privacy and settings. I also enjoyed a few glimpses of life in Mumbai (well-off or not), and enjoyed when Ahana was in New York and New Orleans and mentioned the local aspects of the cities. I did enjoy reading about Ahana’s centering rituals of yoga and tea. I also enjoyed reading about the lives of her family’s servants.

Some parts of the book were a bit silly and/or unbelievable to me, and the book was somewhat predictable in how it ended. I was never really worried about Ahana even though I thought her foolish. I would have enjoyed delving deeper into the backgrounds of the most of the characters besides Ahana, or maybe just some thoughts from their points of view. I probably would have enjoyed this novel more when I was younger. Louisiana Catch has a good premise of self-empowerment and reaching out for help if needed. The book will be released on April 10, 2018. 

Thank you to Rachel Hundert at Meryl Zegarek Public Relations, Inc. for sending me the novel to review. I enjoy the variety and fact that many of the books promoted by this organization are from overseas or are by writers from abroad.