Entertaining, empty calories

This is definitely the book that suffered the most in my “read first, review later” rush last week. Sorry, y’all. I liked it, it just doesn’t stand out for me. Just learned that it’s a debut novel, though, which helps me appreciate it a little more.

The Windfall is a story about the haves and the have-lots set in modern New Delhi, and it’s about how little people really change. Mr. Jha has lived his whole life in West Delhi, in the housing complex where he was raised, where he and his family have mostly wanted for nothing, but it really ended there. He sells a little-mentioned startup website to a large American company, netting a life-changing, titular windfall of $25 million USD. With this, he and his wife purchase a beautiful home in East Delhi and prepare for the move across the city into their new lives.

Unfortunately, I found most of the characters to be superficial and a little irritating, which might have been the point – people ARE superficial and irritating, especially where money is involved. There was a sweet side storyline about an unexpected romance that I couldn’t help but smile about while reading. The son had a pretty good character arc and it was pleasant to watch him evolve, even if it was all pretty easy to telegraph. There were just a lot of people that I wanted to shake and be like “SNAP OUT OF IT” and some of them still were that way at the end. It’s an easy plane read, though, you won’t feel bad about it.