After a family betrayal costs Radha the biggest Kathak competition of her life, she leaves Chicago to live with her mom in New Jersey. There she decides to leave dancing in her past, reinvent her life from scratch, and discover more about her culture and in turn become closer to her dad through food.
She also meets Jai, captain of the Bollywood Beats dance team, and someone who has decided to make the most of high school and all it has to offer considering his dreams of medical school are unattainable. Jai is in desperate need of a choreographer his team to compete in the Winter Showcase, and when Radha learns she'll need to perform in order to pass her class, she'll find a way to help out Jai while maybe, just maybe, rediscovering her passion for dance she's lost over the years.
I had no idea what to expect going into this contemporary, and was surprised at how much I enjoyed the family dynamics and romance it explored. Radha is known to be one of the best Kathak dancers, but when she overhears her competitors talking, details come to life that make her world come crashing down and cast doubt on all her prior victories.
Her parents seperate and she moves to New Jersey, refusing to perform in front of an audience again, much to the disdain of her mother also a former dancer. The book explores her anxiety she has developed as a result, and explores therapy and medication she uses to help her live with it. Radha's father also sends her cooking supplies and a recipe book her dadaji paternal grandfather used when opening his dhaba roadside restaurant in India and has since been passed on after his death.
What Radha has to eventually discover is if her cooking has truly been a way to reconnect with her culture, or if she has been using it as a distraction and a way to avoid confronting her complicated feelings about performing. On the other hand, Jai is slated to graduate as valedictorian of his high school class. He's captain of the Bollywood Beats dance team and has dreamed to attend Columbia to study medicine and become a doctor.
