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| Categories | Genre Fiction |
| Author | Reema Patel |
| Publisher | Ballantine Books (May 10, 2022) |
| Language | English |
| Paperback | 336 pages |
| Item Weight | 1.2 pounds |
| Dimensions |
6.4 x 1.09 x 9.6 inches |
I. Book introduction
A savvy former street child working at a law office in Mumbai fights for redemption and a chance to live life on her own terms in this “smart, haunting, and compulsively readable” (Amy Jones, author of We’re All in This Together) debut novel about fortune and survival.
“A page-turner of a story that doesn’t shy away from exploring hard and painful truths about the way people navigate the systemic conditions of society.”—Zalika Reid-Benta, author of Frying Plantain
Rakhi is a twenty-three-year-old haunted by the grisly aftermath of an incident that led to the loss of her best friend eleven years ago. Constantly reminded she doesn’t belong, Rakhi lives alone in a Mumbai slum, working as a lowly office assistant at Justice For All, a struggling human-rights law organization headed by the renowned lawyer who gave her a fresh start.
Fiercely intelligent and in possession of a sharp wit and an even sharper tongue, Rakhi is nobody’s fool, even if she is underestimated by everyone around her. Rakhi’s life isn’t much, but she’s managing. That is, until Rubina Mansoor, a fading former Bollywood starlet, tries to edge her way back into the spotlight by becoming a celebrity ambassador for Justice For All. Steering the organization into uncharted territories, she demands an internship for Alex, a young family friend from Canada and Harvard-bound graduate student. Ambitious, persistent, and naïve, Alex persuades Rakhi to show him “the real” India. In exchange, he’ll do something to further Rakhi’s dreams in a transaction that seems harmless, at first.
As old guilt and new aspirations collide, everything Rakhi once knew to be true is set ablaze. And as the stakes mount, she will come face-to-face with the difficult choices and moral compromises that people make in order to survive, no matter the cost. Reema Patel’s transportive debut novel offers a moving, smart, and arrestingly clever look at the cost of ambition and power in reclaiming one’s story.
Editorial Reviews
“Cynical, street-smart Rakhi . . . is a sharply drawn protagonist [who] gives this novel power and zest.”—Kirkus Reviews
“An astonishingly gifted storyteller, Reema Patel writes with a confidence, insight, and skill that belies her status as a debut novelist. A smart, haunting, compulsively readable novel with tightly woven plot and an unforgettable narrator, Such Big Dreams is a gripping story you’ll want to simultaneously race through at breakneck speed and slow down to savor every word.”—Amy Jones, author of We’re All in This Together
“From the very first page, Such Big Dreams grabs you by the throat and doesn’t let go. Patel’s prose jumps with energy, plunging the reader into a page-turner of a story that doesn’t shy away from exploring hard and painful truths about the way people navigate the systemic conditions of society. With assured writing, Patel explores themes ranging from societal elitism to the nuances of interpersonal betrayal. Visceral and kinetic, Such Big Dreams is a splash of a debut.”—Zalika Reid-Benta, author of Frying Plantain
“Such Big Dreams charts the ambitions, disappointments, and dreams of two people who are improbably thrust together as they try to find their way in—and make their mark on—a bustling Mumbai that’s indifferent to their struggles. Unflinching yet written with compassion and insight, Such Big Dreams is a richly textured and powerful novel that, like Mumbai itself, pulsates with humanity. Patel is a writer to watch. I absolutely loved this book.”—Bianca Marais, author of Hum If You Don’t Know the Words
“Mumbai has inspired many great novels about the city, and now we can add Patel’s Such Big Dreams to that list. Her portrayal of Mumbai is fresh, vivid, and personal, in part because of the book’s charming and perceptive narrator, Rakhi. I finished the book with a sigh of regret, feeling already the loss of Rakhi and the gift of Patel’s Mumbai.”—Shyam Selvadurai, author of Funny Boy
“Debut novelist Patel vividly portrays the many strata of Mumbai, from the streets to the slums to the upper echelons, through the eyes of a young woman seeking control of her own future.”—Booklist
“Patel’s riveting debut examines the exploitive class structure in Mumbai and the pitfalls for those on the lower rung. . . . With a captivating arc . . . the story highlights the impact of greed in a poverty-stricken Mumbai. It’s a powerful debut.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Amazon.com Review
An Amazon Best Book of May 2022: With a whip-smart, funny, and strong-willed woman at its core, Such Big Dreams is an absolute pleasure to read. Growing up homeless on the streets of Mumbai, 23-year-old Rakhi is hardwired with a certain grit and skepticism about the world—especially because her best friend on the streets disappeared ten years ago. Now an adult, she’s landed on her feet, working as a personal assistant at a nonprofit human rights law organization, and with the encouragement of her boss and a white intern, she begins to dream of a life beyond the slum where she lives and the menial tasks she performs. But dreams are never that easy. There’s a lot that Patel tackles in this book—the disparity of wealth in India and abroad, the education gap; the non-profit world commandeered by celebrity; loss and love—and yet, it’s done with such a deft hand that it’s impossible to put this book down. Rakhi is a narrator you will root for and want as your best friend—she’s got guts, gusto, and dares to dream, and there’s nothing better than that. —Al Woodworth, Amazon Editor
About Reema Patel
Reema Patel holds a BA from McGill University and a JD from the University of Windsor. After working in Mumbai in the youth non-profit sector and in human-rights advocacy, she has spent the past ten years working in provincial and municipal government. An excerpt from Such Big Dreams, her first novel, won the Penguin Random House Student Award for Fiction at the University of Toronto’s School of Continuing Studies. She lives in Toronto, where she currently works as a lawyer.
II. [Reviews] Such Big Dreams by Reema Patel
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1. ANNE L.FOSTER review Such Big Dreams
This is a fascinating look at Mumbai which I visited in 1974 when I was in college on Semester at Sea. Protagonist Rakhi works for Justice For All as an office assistant. But when new intern, Alex arrives things change quickly as she has many of her own ideas but is often forced to do what others expect her to do. Living in the slums, she tries to hide this fact as many of her co-workers make snide remarks which of course hurts her feelings. But now she is thrown into circumstances she is unaware of and forced to make decisions she might not make on her own. This is an in-depth look at a country and people who are often un-noticed and Patel brings a fresh perspective to this incredible novel!
Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC!
2. THELMA review Such Big Dreams
Such Big Dreams is The story of Rakhi who has been living on the streets for so long, moving around in Mumbai slums. her life hasn’t improved even if thou she was “saved” by a woman for whom she work and who thought she really cared for her.
Rakhi’s life wasn’t easy I really had a hard time reading what she was going through, people were terrible to her. there was a constant feeling of sadness and loss of hope as people were very unfair over and over again, there was a lot of bullying and betrayals around her “friends”
Rakhi was a very strong person even though it feels like she is not, as people constantly took advantage of her but she was enduring, persistent, and never gave up even though life was always undermining her way.
Alex is a new intern coming from Canada is also not what we all thought, he was very nice wanting to learn all about the culture, asking Rakhi to take him around so he can see the real culture in India in exchange he will pay her so she could save for a good college.
I really wanted to see more happiness in Rakhi’s life, after all, she went through I feel like two pages weren’t enough to redeem the pain, I felt a constant sadness during most of the book, and I felt angry with Alex, Gauri Ma’am’s, and Babloo these people were to be the best friends and the ones who were gonna help and be there for Rakhi but instead, they were the worst, leaving her without a home, a job and totally alone.
Tazim, Delphine, Lorna, and Claire were among the nice people that really saw Rakhi, the hard work and the tears she had to endure to finally be able to be what she wanted.
3. LIZ review Such Big Dreams
Such Big Dreams is a debut novel about Rakhi, a former street child who now works as an office assistant in the office of a legal nonprofit. She’s still poor and lives in a Mumbai slum. When Alex arrives from Canada as an intern for the nonprofit, he latches on to Rakhi and wants her to show him the “real India”, not the upper class bubble his aunt and uncle live in. Meanwhile, the head of the nonprofit is approached by an aging star to help raise the profile of the NGO.
Patel does a fabulous job of giving us a real sense of place. Rakhi may not have had much formal education, but she’s smart and understands things intuitively. She especially understands the logistics of being poor in India. As she tells Alex, “ You are reading…But you are not living here. You know nothing about India.” And, as the story goes on, she is one of the few that sees the hypocrisy of the rich and famous. “A procession of people with homes – some of them living in high rise luxury flats built on the remains of slums -shouting about how housing is a human right.”
As the book goes on, it gets darker. Rakhi sees just how evil people can be when money is involved. It’s a sad testament to how few people can be trusted.
Make sure to read The Author’s Note. I was unaware the Behrampada slum fire was a real event. She raises some interesting questions here and the book would make a fabulous book club selection.
My one problem with the book is she includes a large number of Indian words without providing a translation. While I could sometimes infer the meaning, I had to google quite a few of them to make sure I was grasping the definition. And some of those I googled were, let’s say, very colorful.
My thanks to Netgalley and Ballantine Books for an advance copy of this book.
4. KERRIN review Such Big Dreams
Now Available.
A fantastic debut novel about a former street child in Bombay who is now working as an office assistant at a civil rights law firm. The book looks at Bombay slums, the impact of NGOs, celebrities, gangs, equal rights, and what it means to have dreams of a better life.
4.5-stars rounded up. I am not giving it a full 5-stars since the author used many Hindi words that I did not know, such as firanghis, kaamwali, bakvaas, Didi, Bilkul, chor, randi, and chutiyas. I got tired of having to look them up.
5. THOMAS review Such Big Dreams
4 stars for a realistic portrait of modern day Mumbai/Bombay. This book was written by a Canadian woman who lived and worked in Mumbai in her early twenties.
The book explores how a woman who was a street kid was able, with help, to transition from living on the streets, to becoming a woman with a job and income sufficient to support herself. The author says she was inspired to write this book by a 2 major fires in a slum named Behrampada. the first fire destroyed almost 300 huts, killing 3 and injuring 29. Twenty five hundred were left homeless, but they rebuilt. There was a 2nd devastating fire in 2011. The author explores the possibility that the fires were deliberately set.
There is a great deal of local color, i.e., descriptions of foods, and interactions between Western visitors/ temporary interns and employees of a public interest non profit law firm. I enjoyed reading it and liked the ending.
One quote: Rakhi’s home: “Letting out one of those big yawns that almost unhinges my jaw, I roll onto my side. Last night, flash rains banged down on my leaky tin roof like a herd of sharp clawed cats, The steady sound of water dripping into a plastic bucket would drive anyone else to tears, but I was grateful to be kept awake a little while longer.”
#SuchBigDreams #NetGalley.
Thanks to Ballantine Books for sending me this eARC through NetGalley.
Pub date 26 Apr 2022
6. CAROL review Such Big Dreams
Rakhi is a former street child taken under the wing of a civil rights lawyer in Mumbai/Bombay and eventually given a job and help finding a place to live which is in a slum but she’s better off than many people. She has been working for Gauri Verma (Rakhi calls her Gauri Ma’am which I assume is a term of respect with Gauri being the character’s surname) for 5 years when Alex, a Harvard-educated Canadian, comes to work as an intern for the law firm. Rakhi understands and reads English although she doesn’t speak it very well and it becomes part of her job to acclimate Alex to life in India and improve her English at the same time.
I really enjoyed this well-written book and the characters introduced to us throughout the story. As someone else mentioned, the number of hindi words in the book was slightly distracting and a glossary would’ve been nice but after a while I just guessed what the words meant. Descriptions of living and working conditions pulled at my heartstrings and made me realize how many comforts I take for granted. Although I think most countries have groups of haves and have nots, the stark contrast between the two groups really stands out in this book. I learned many things from reading it and I’m impressed by the author’s talent. I highly recommend this debut novel by another gifted Canadian.
I won a copy of this book in a Goodreads giveaway so my thanks to Penguin Random House Canada and to Goodreads. All opinions expressed are my own.
7. KASA COTUGNO review Such Big Dreams
With its clear-eyed depiction of life in the “Behind the Beautiful Forevers” world of Mumbai, Such Big Dreams finds a place on my favorites shelf. Reema Patel herself a lawyer in Canada spent time in a nonprofit law office there, and her experiences there gave her the basis for how such an organization works in India. Each of the characters is so well drawn that it’s possible to imagine they were drawn from life. At the center is Rakhi, who narrates her history with unsentimental clarity. Having lived on the streets since she was nine, she’s nobody’s fool, and faces up to each challenge, harboring her very human guilts and channeling them into strengths. A very strong debut.
8. NANCY review Such Big Dreams
A young woman rises from the streets, with dreams of moving beyond the slums of Mumbai, but learns that class divisions are hard to scale.
I loved the character Rakhi. After the death of her parents she ran away from a cruel uncle. As a child of the streets, she is welcomed into a gang of children lead by her perceived savior Babloo. After their involvement in a crime, Rakhi is sent to a school run by nuns where a lawyer for Justice For All discovers her and takes her on as a pet project.
Now an adult, Rakhi’s mentor treats her like a servant while offering hope for freedom and self-determination without trusting she is ready for them. Then, the Canadian Alex comes to intern at Justice For All. He notes Rakhi’s innate intelligence and pushes her to think for herself and reach for her dreams.
What must it be like, being a starched-shirt Pali Hill rich boy like Alex? Or these white girls with yellow hair, all of them coming to India to dip their toes into our shit, pretending like our problems are their problems, then going home and never coming back?
from Such Big Dreams by Reema Patel
A series of events build to a dramatic conclusion. An aging movie star wants to rebrand herself and chooses Justice for All as her pet project. It could help the floundering NGO back on its feet. The star takes over control. Alex’s rich family will do anything to advance their business. Babloo reenters Rakhi’s life and she discovers he is not the hero she believed him to be. Rakhi is inspired to claim her future. It all leads to disaster.
A fantastic read, this immersive novel has great characters, a propelling story line, and insight into contemporary life in India.
I received a free egalley from the publisher through NetGalley. My review is fair and unbiased.
9. CAT review Such Big Dreams
This is Reema Patel’s debut novel and based on her clarity in describing human nature alone, I see a bright future for this author.
Rakhi grew up a street kid in the slums of Mumbai. The flashbacks to her childhood are sad and difficult to read, so imagine how the kids feel that live this life every day while we sit and read our books. It’s that moving. Ms. Patel has devoted years of her life working in Mumbai, so her depiction of the children’s daily struggle to live is brought to life in her words.
After a petty crime goes horribly wrong, Rakhi is saved from the orphanage and certain death in prison when she catches the eye of her benefactor, the executive director of a human rights law firm, Gauri Ma’am. Rakhi does well in school and begins working as an intern at Gauri Ma’am’s establishment.
The stark difference between Rakhi and other employees at the firm is as vast as night and day. They enjoy meals, a roof over their head that doesn’t leak, and nice clothing that is always clean. Rakhi struggles to keep up the facade. This aspect alone insinuates the point, that once homeless and expendable, always that way in India. When a new intern takes a job at the law firm, these differences are suddenly smeared in Rakhi’s face. As she struggles to trust those who want to help her, she sees cracks in their facade that are reminiscent of lessons she painfully learned as a child on the streets.
Full of colorful descriptions of Indian food, habits, and social lives, and what living in a city the size of Mumbai entails (think transportation, restaurants, sanitation), Reema Patel’s first novel is a must-read for anyone who appreciates sincere human drams stories.
Sincere thanks to Random House- Ballantine for an ARC in exchange for my honest review. This book is now available.
10. STAR GATER review Such Big Dreams
This may be one of my top 5 favorites of the year. With that said, please note, I won the physical book off GoodReads, and found the audio on Libby. I chose to listen gaining the total experience from the author. The life, corruption, abuse, and socioeconomic gap in India is portrayed. The narrator pronounces names and places smoothly, where I would stumble reading.
The author intertwined the past and present seamlessly. The story hits so many of my emotions: I laughed and cried, was annoyed, and felt guilt. The synopsis sums the book up, and I’m not going to repeat it, nor do I want to spoil.
Debut novel and I hope she doesn’t change her style. This is beautifully done.
III. [Quote] Such Big Dreams by Reema Patel
The best book quotes from Such Big Dreams by Reema Patel
“The urban poor’s overreliance on social networks for security and support is derived, in part, from the erosion of their trust in government, which is usually warranted. Evictions, demolitions, and removals, as well as patronage and corruption, have all served to undermine the establishment of robust urban governance. Together with rising land prices, and poor-quality and crumbling services, they have given rise to a sense of insecurity and social exclusion, which can erode social connectivity.”
“What myths contribute to our ideas about who is entitled to occupy land, and who isn’t?”
Book excerpts: Such Big Dreams by Reema Patel
1.
This time, the flames are everywhere—licking the walls, sweeping across the tin roof of my one-room hut.
I bolt upright in the dark, a full-body scream ready to erupt from somewhere deep inside my lungs. My hands reach for my throat as I gasp for air. Panic courses through my body while I try to recall Dr. Pereira’s bad-dream exercise, the one she told me to do each time this happens.
“When you wake up,” she said, “sit on the edge of your bed and put your feet on the floor.” I had to tell her I don’t have a bed, just a thin mat. “So sit at the edge of your mat cross-legged,” she replied, patiently. “Then, name out loud the objects in the room.”
Trembling, I fold one leg under the other and try to focus on the dim outlines of my belongings scattered around me.
In the corner of the room, my heavy, steel cabinet. “Almirah.”
Beside it, the cooking vessel I never use. “Pot.”
Drenched, sweaty clothes plastered to my back. “Kurta,” I mutter.
Then I notice the damp, heavy weight tickling my neck. “Hair.”
I slide a cautious hand toward the little blue Nokia that Gauri Ma’am gave me when I started working for her. “Phone.” I clutch it tight. The small screen oozes a dull green glow, which I hold up in front of me to illuminate the room.
Shining the light on my cassette player, I press the eject button with a trembling finger and retrieve the tiny crystal elephant from its hiding spot. “Elephant.” As I say the word and cradle the figurine in my palm, I can sense the flames of my nightmare start to recede.
And now for the last, most stupidest part of Dr. Pereira’s night terror exercise: “I am awake,” I whisper into the shadows. “I am safe.”
My shoulders tense as I wait for flames to climb back up the walls, sparks to burrow into my clothes. None of that happens, though. I let out a deep breath and flop back onto my mat, dank and musty from my sweat and the humid monsoon air.
The nightmares started eleven years ago, after the paanwala incident. Just after I lost Babloo. They used to come almost every night. They’ve since tapered off to a few times a week, but they’re just as vivid as ever. Most nights I try to stay awake for as long as I can, fighting the lull of the dead air and emptiness of my one-room hut, before drifting into broken sleep by two or three in the morning.
Behrampada slum sprawls out over seven acres in the middle of Bombay—or Mumbai, if that’s what you want to call it—an island city flooded with too many people with too-big dreams. By the time I come home in the evenings, the slum roars with noise: The hiss and flare of gas cooking cylinders being lit; tawas and kadais clanging on stovetops. Women shouting at their husbands, who in turn shout back. Someone’s shrieking child is always chasing someone else’s bleating goat. And when India wins a cricket match, firecrackers burst in the lanes like fistfuls of corn popping. By midnight, though, people retreat inside and switch off their television sets, and the pressures that build up in Behrampada’s crowded huts and narrow lanes fizzle out until dawn. Except for the squeals of horny rats and the occasional bottle smashing, all goes quiet—and that’s when the night terrors come for me.
Letting out one of those big yawns that almost unhinges my jaw, I roll onto my side. Last night, flash rains banged down on my leaky tin roof like a herd of sharp-clawed cats. The steady sound of water dripping into a plastic bucket would drive anyone else to tears, but I was grateful to be kept awake for a little while longer. As the storm died down, though, so did the noise, and I eventually fell asleep. If I had the secret weapons that important people do, like loud English or proper Hindi, I’d command the nearby Garib Nawaz Masjid to keep the call to prayer going all night, crying out “Allahu akbar” and “la ilaha illa-Allah” on loop from their tinny loudspeakers. “We have to help Rakhi keep the night terrors away,” the muezzin would reply flatly, if anyone complained about his six-hour azaan.
Already, I hear the clamor of the people of Behrampada as they start to stir, which means it’s just past five. By six, the sun has risen, and by seven, I’ve used the stinking public toilet and bathed. By eight, I’ve drunk a cup of tea and gotten dressed, and am ready to leave for work.
On this muggy July morning, the main road from Behrampada to Bandra Station glistens with a slick layer of oil, water, and dirt. I take careful strides over the puddle-filled potholes dotting the street, but the cotton ankles of my clean salwar end up speckled with mud anyway. “Dressing smart tells the world you think our work is valuable,” Gauri Ma’am told me during my first week at the office, after I wore the same salwar kameez for three days straight. She handed me a stack of her daughter’s old clothes the next day.
It’s only as I pause on the station bridge to inspect the mud splatters on the backs of my pant legs that I spot my train pulling into the station. The people who have been waiting on the platform are already getting inside, which means I have less than fifteen seconds before it departs. By the time I fly down the stairs to the platform, the train has started to move again. The slanted green-and-yellow stripes of the ladies’ general compartment are exactly two cars away.
I haven’t chased after a moving train in a long time. During our years living on the street, Babloo and I were always running. Running away, that is—from policewalas, shopkeepers, and passengers who’d had enough of us. While other children had their hair oiled and combed, rode in autorickshaws to school, and ate proper lunches and dinners, we were leaping onto moving trains, traveling ticketless up and down the railway lines, looking for something to put into our growling bellies.
The train picks up speed, so I do, too. There’s only one way on now, and it’s to jump in the open door closest to me—the first-class ladies’ compartment. I don’t have a first-class pass, but that’s never stopped me before. I reach out for the pole in the doorway, the tip of my middle finger grazing the cool metal, but it’s inching away from me. I’m going to have to leap for it. Bracing myself, I lurch forward, stretching for the pole with my left hand, this time gripping it firmly. Quickly, I suck in my breath and vault over the gap as the train gains momentum, and my outer hip takes a sharp blow from the pole while my feet slam down onto the metal floor. Out the open door, the city rushes past me. I am inside. Panting like a dog on a summer day, but inside.
The train roars down the Harbour Line toward the next stop, Mahim Station. I’ll hop out there and switch into the ladies’ general compartment. The total fine for ticketless travel would come to three hundred rupees if they caught me right now. I only have seventy rupees in my purse, and the Railway Police holding cells swell with ankle-deep sludge during monsoon season.
The wind from outside undoes most of the curls from my ponytail, which blow about in a thousand directions. I must look like some deranged woman, the kind whose uncle or husband drags her to a temple so a priest can beat the evil spirits out of her. As I twist fistfuls of hair into a massive bun at the back of my neck, strong gusts continue to hit my face, and the curls around my forehead whip at my temples.
When I finally turn away from the door and toward the inside of the car, I am struck by the emptiness, the quiet of first class. Nobody is inching in front of me, threatening to steal my breeze. On the bench facing me are a tall college girl in a pink T-shirt and a squat lady in a faded yellow salwar kameez with white embroidery. Between them are two whole inches of empty space. In the general compartment, four or five women will squash onto one bench together. The last one to jostle in will tell the others to “shift, please,” until at least a third of her behind is on the seat. And she’ll hang off the edge like that, straining her hips and thighs, because if she doesn’t sit there, someone else will.
Seats by the window with maximum airflow are in high demand, like gold at Diwali, or a fair price for onions. At this time of day, the ladies’ general compartment is so packed that nobody who boards at Bandra gets breeze. Only a few months ago, in the pre-monsoon heat that drives the entire city into random fits of rage, some fat, middle-aged woman with green glass bangles thought she could elbow me out of a seat I was about to squeeze into. She didn’t know who she was dealing with. Somewhere in the scuffle, her glass bangles snapped, scraping into my wrist, cutting deep enough to leave a mark. I got the seat in the end.
….
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