OverDrive would like to use cookies to store information on your computer to improve your user experience at our Website. One of the cookies we use is critical for certain aspects of the site to operate and has already been set. You may delete and block all cookies from this site, but this could affect certain features or services of the site. To find out more about the cookies we use and how to delete them, click here to see our Privacy Policy.
An Indian American family is turned upside down when the parents split up thirty-six years into their arranged marriage in this “heartwarming journey of self-discovery” (Southern Living). “Touching . . . both funny and moving—a family drama the entire family can enjoy.”—Reader’s Digest A REAL SIMPLE BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR • LILLY’S LIBRARY PICK "I have a soft spot for underdogs. And late bloomers. You’ve told me a lot of things about yourself, so let me tell you something about me." After thirty-six years of a dutiful but unhappy arranged marriage, recently divorced Suresh and Lata Raman find themselves starting new paths in life. Suresh is trying to navigate the world of online dating on a website that caters to Indians and is striking out at every turn—until he meets a mysterious, devastatingly attractive younger woman who seems to be smitten with him. Lata is enjoying her newfound independence, but she's caught off guard when a professor in his early sixties starts to flirt with her. Meanwhile, Suresh and Lata's daughter, Priya, thinks her father's online pursuits are distasteful even as she embarks upon a clandestine affair of her own. And their son, Nikesh, pretends at a seemingly perfect marriage with his law-firm colleague and their young son, but hides the truth of what his relationship really entails. Over the course of three weeks in August, the whole family will uncover one another's secrets, confront the limits of love and loyalty, and explore life's second chances. Charming, funny, and moving, Late Bloomers introduces a delightful new voice in fiction with the story of four individuals trying to understand how to be happy in their own lives—and as a family.
An Indian American family is turned upside down when the parents split up thirty-six years into their arranged marriage in this “heartwarming journey of self-discovery” (Southern Living). “Touching . . . both funny and moving—a family drama the entire family can enjoy.”—Reader’s Digest A REAL SIMPLE BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR • LILLY’S LIBRARY PICK "I have a soft spot for underdogs. And late bloomers. You’ve told me a lot of things about yourself, so let me tell you something about me." After thirty-six years of a dutiful but unhappy arranged marriage, recently divorced Suresh and Lata Raman find themselves starting new paths in life. Suresh is trying to navigate the world of online dating on a website that caters to Indians and is striking out at every turn—until he meets a mysterious, devastatingly attractive younger woman who seems to be smitten with him. Lata is enjoying her newfound independence, but she's caught off guard when a professor in his early sixties starts to flirt with her. Meanwhile, Suresh and Lata's daughter, Priya, thinks her father's online pursuits are distasteful even as she embarks upon a clandestine affair of her own. And their son, Nikesh, pretends at a seemingly perfect marriage with his law-firm colleague and their young son, but hides the truth of what his relationship really entails. Over the course of three weeks in August, the whole family will uncover one another's secrets, confront the limits of love and loyalty, and explore life's second chances. Charming, funny, and moving, Late Bloomers introduces a delightful new voice in fiction with the story of four individuals trying to understand how to be happy in their own lives—and as a family.
Due to publisher restrictions the library cannot purchase additional copies of this title, and we apologize if there is a long waiting list. Be sure to check for other copies, because there may be other editions available.
Due to publisher restrictions the library cannot purchase additional copies of this title, and we apologize if there is a long waiting list. Be sure to check for other copies, because there may be other editions available.
Excerpts-
From the cover1
Suresh
All these internet women lie, I tell you. All of them. Funny that the anonymity draws everyone in. But it’s also what keeps you from trusting a word.
Sometimes the lies are about the fundamentals: previous marriages, whether they have kids, what line of work they’re in. Oh, and age. Age is a big one. The last date I went on was with a woman whose profile said forty-one. Impossible! There wasn’t a chance that Ms. Mittal (formerly Mrs. Mittal) was a day under fifty.
My son, Nikesh, laughed at me when I told him about that one. “But, Dad,” he said, “you are fifty-nine.” Well that may be, but I didn’t go around grossly exaggerating for sport. I was more reasonable about it all. On my profile, I described myself as “Suresh Raman, a healthy and active, five-foot-ten, fifty-five-year-old divorced man of Indian origin.”
All right, so fifty-five was four years ago, the height was a rough estimate, and “active” was only an accurate description if it included toenail-clipping while watching CNN in my carpeted den. But these were reasonable deviations from the truth. RDTs, I called them. So long as you kept it reasonable, where was the harm, really?
It was early evening now. I parked my SUV in front of a small, white brick house. I had to quash my misgivings—for the next few hours, at least. I reminded myself: This was a first date, a new woman, a clean slate.
I sniffed under my arms. Good, still powdery fresh. I’d left my house in Clayborn, Texas, three hours ago, but I blasted the AC the entire drive to Austin. Whatever my doubts about lying internet women, I’d never want a date to see unsightly wet patches blooming across my shirt.
I checked my reflection in the rearview mirror. Even at this hour, the late-August sun beamed harsh and unforgiving. My eyebrows looked like two furry worms wriggling around a pockmarked forehead. I licked my forefinger and tried pasting down the errant hairs. But it was useless. Hairs kept popping up in every direction. Oh well. Perhaps the restaurant would be dim and Mallika wouldn’t notice the unruly duo dancing above my eyelids.
Mallika. We’d been emailing each other for two weeks. Now, this one did not seem like a liar. I couldn’t be sure, of course, as I’d yet to see her in the flesh. At the moment, she was still three parts fantasy to one part reality—a concoction of my hazy, lonely brain. Though given the mendacious tendencies of these internet women, it was hard to maintain any fantasy for long.
Mind you, this wasn’t just abstract cynicism talking. It came from months of experience. And in my months of experience, I’d learned that even when these internet women weren’t lying about important things, like age, then they were lying about ridiculous things—things I wouldn’t have even cared about had they told me the truth. But when I discovered they’d lied about it, I had to assume it meant something.
Last month, for example, I went out with this divorced real estate agent from Baton Rouge named Usha. She lied about all kinds of trivialities. Favorite Food: Italian.
Trusting this preference in her profile, I suggested going to the Olive Garden on our first date. It had been a tiring six-hour drive from Clayborn to Baton Rouge, but I wanted to show her that I was sensitive to this detail about her—that I cared enough to remember. Upon hearing my suggestion, she shrugged and explained...
Reviews-
March 27, 2023 Varadarajan debuts with an endearing exploration of an Indian American family’s search for new beginnings. After 36 years, the Ramans call it quits on their arranged marriage. Lata moves into a condo and gets a job as a librarian, the allure of these first-time experiences outweighing the challenges of singlehood. Suresh, on the other hand, turns to internet dating. (For his profile, he shaves four years off his age, calling himself 55.)Meanwhile, their adult children navigate their own complicated lives. Nikesh, the star of the family with his perfect lawyer-wife, Denise, and their eight-month-old son, is hiding a secret about his relationship with Denise. His older sister, Priya, a history professor who’s considered a problem child because she’s unmarried and childless at 35, is hiding an affair with a man her parents would never approve of. Suresh meets an attractive woman too young for him, while Lata agrees to her first-ever date, but the accumulating secrets threaten to shake the family’s foundations. Striking narration from each of the family members and believable character development add to Varadarajan’s bold challenge to traditional South Asian conventions for a stringent life plan. These strong voices leave an indelible mark. Agent: Kim Witherspoon, InkWell Management.
After 36 years in an arranged marriage, Lata Raman decides that she has had enough. Defying her traditional Indian upbringing, she divorces her husband, Suresh, and moves out of their family home. Then she finds her first job and wonders what comes next. Meanwhile, Suresh doesn't understand what has gone wrong and looks to online dating apps for direction. The couple's grown children, Priya and Nikesh, chafe against their parents' nontraditional futures while pursuing equally nontraditional lives for themselves. Priya is seeing a married man, and Nikesh is not married to the mother of his child;neither has told their parents. Narrators Vikas Adam, Deepa Samuel, Shahjehan Khan, and Mehr Dudeja give voice to the Raman family, capturing their wit and vivacity and conveying the difficulties of balancing their new lives with the old. With pitch-perfect accents and excellent timing, the narrators' performances are so vibrant and engaging that listeners may feel like they've made new friends. VERDICT Varadarajan's debut about starting over, adopting new codes of conduct, and defying tradition while remaining a family strikes a chord. Highly recommended for fans of Sonya Lalli's Grown-Up Pose or Sonali Dev's The Vibrant Years.--Joanna M. Burkhardt
Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
Title Information+
Publisher
Books on Tape
OverDrive Listen
Release date:
OverDrive MP3 Audiobook
Release date:
Digital Rights Information+
OverDrive MP3 Audiobook
Burn to CD:
Permitted
Transfer to device:
Permitted
Transfer to Apple® device:
Permitted
Public performance:
Not permitted
File-sharing:
Not permitted
Peer-to-peer usage:
Not permitted
All copies of this title, including those transferred to portable devices and other media, must be deleted/destroyed at the end of the lending period.
Please update to the latest version of the OverDrive app to stream videos.
Device Compatibility Notice
The OverDrive app is required for this format on your current device.
Bahrain, Egypt, Hong Kong, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the Sudan, the Syrian Arab Republic, Tunisia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen
You've reached your library's checkout limit for digital titles.
To make room for more checkouts, you may be able to return titles from your Checkouts page.
Excessive Checkout Limit Reached.
There have been too many titles checked out and returned by your account within a short period of time.
Try again in several days. If you are still not able to check out titles after 7 days, please contact Support.
You have already checked out this title. To access it, return to your Checkouts page.
This title is not available for your card type. If you think this is an error contact support.
There are no copies of this issue left to borrow. Please try to borrow this title again when a new issue is released.
| Sign In
You will be prompted to sign into your library account on the next page.
If this is your first time selecting “Send to NOOK,” you will then be taken to a Barnes & Noble page to sign into (or create) your NOOK account. You should only have to sign into your NOOK account once to link it to your library account. After this one-time step, periodicals will be automatically sent to your NOOK account when you select "Send to NOOK."
The first time you select “Send to NOOK,” you will be taken to a Barnes & Noble page to sign into (or create) your NOOK account. You should only have to sign into your NOOK account once to link it to your library account. After this one-time step, periodicals will be automatically sent to your NOOK account when you select "Send to NOOK."
You can read periodicals on any NOOK tablet or in the free NOOK reading app for iOS, Android or Windows 8.
This perfectly titled audiobook will immerse listeners in the misadventures of an Indian American family and have them rooting for each member to find happiness. The ensemble of narrators give flawless performances. Vikas Adam sprinkles a dash of humor into his expressive tones to portray the overbearing but oddly sympathetic father, Suresh, whose search for love after divorce takes an unlikely turn. Deepa Samuel captures ex-wife Lata's resentment over her lengthy arranged marriage, while conveying her joy at her new life. Their adult daughter Priya's affair with a married man is depicted with nuance by Mehr Dudeja. Shahjehan Khan's easygoing intonations help listeners invest in son Nikesh's struggle to settle his relationship with the mother of his son. M.J. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2023, Portland, Maine
