With Valentine’s Day around the corner, here is a quick look at two books meant for the season.
1. THE LOVE HYPOTHESIS BY ALI HAZELWOOD
As a third-year Ph.D. candidate, Olive Smith does not believe in lasting romantic relationships but her best friend does, and that is what got her into this situation. Convincing Anh that Olive on her way to a happily ever after was always going to be tough, scientists require proof. So, like any self-respecting woman, Olive panics and kisses the first man she sees.
That man is none other than Adam Carlsen, a young hotshot professor and well-known ass. Which is why Olive is positively floored when he agrees to keep her charade a secret and be her fake boyfriend. But when a big science conference goes haywire, their little experiment feels dangerously close to combustion.
Olive soon discovers that the only thing more complicated than a hypothesis on love is putting her own heart under the microscope.
2. ARZU BY RIVA RAZDAN
It is 1991, and India’s economy is opening up to foreign investment for the very first time. For wealthy business families across the country, however, it is a move fraught with uncertainty.
In Bombay, Arzu, the pampered daughter of a newspaper mogul, finds the situation particularly tense.
Her one concern is to score a proposal from her millionaire boyfriend before the country’s celebrated liberalization sours his mood any further.
Then, an innocent gesture on her part causes all her plans to go awry, and Arzu escapes to New York City with her snobby aunt Parul on the pretext of attending finishing school.
While Parul Bua’s one-point agenda is to fix her up with a suitable match.
Arzu, revelling in the heady independence that New York offers, finds herself poised on the brink of an idea that could change the nature of an entire industry back home.
Now, even as Arzu negotiates catty debutante ball drama and evades the charms of her father’s smug protege,she must prove her worth to investors so as to silence her critics.
The question remains, can someone who has always played second fiddle to the men in her life discover how to become the heroine of her own story?