Girls Burn Brighter: A Novel

An Amazon Best Book of March 2018: I first imagined that the title of Girls Burn Brighter referred to the custom of widows immolating themselves upon their husbands' funeral pyres. While no women suffer that fate in this contemporary novel, that's practically the only bad thing that doesn't happen to best friends Poornima and Savitha, who grow up in rural India. The two young women become soul mates as they work long hours together in Poornima's father's weaving hut, but a late-night attack on Savitha forces her out of Poornima's life shortly before Poornima enters an arranged marriage. Shobha Rao's writing power builds in the spaces between words, her lean prose making the glimpses she shows of the breathtaking misogyny the girls endure all the more horrifying. This is not an emotionally gentle novel. You'll be outraged and hopeful, shocked and awakened. And throughout, Poornima and Savitha do burn brighter, fueled by their unshakable determination to find each other again. —Adrian Liang, Amazon Book Review