Book Review: Once Upon A Crush by Kiran Manral

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A fun, light romcom that you can easily breeze through over a weekend, Once Upon A Crush by Kiran Manral is the story of a 29 year old girl Rayna De. She is much like the girl next door, with parents who are after her life to get married to a guy called Sid Bose and a boss straight from hell, ensuring that her life, well for the lack another appropriate word- stays interesting.

Time for a twist in the plot and walks into her office a man named Deven Ahuja who sets Ms De's heart a fluttering and she sees Mr Darcy and a certain vampire with very good looks Mr Cullen, in him. Unfortunately, as is often in such cases, the man has been claimed. He has a girlfriend and if Page 3 reports are to be believed by one and Rayna, then they seem to be pretty happy together. So, as Rayna reasons by herself, there is no reason why should Deven throw even a sideway glance at her.

But does he? Or is Sid Bose able to woo our heroine? To know this and some more you will have to pick up your own copy of Once Upon A Crush.


The plot of the book is nothing new and you might have seen it a few times in different avatars on the silver screen as well. Manral, a well-known blogger and author manages to make this story her own by showcasing the struggles that Rayna a woman of contemporary times (who is financially independent and can look after herself well, thank you very much), goes through under the societal pressures in the name of matrimony (read self-doubt).

I met Manral at Women Writer's Fest here in Kolkata a couple of years ago and liked the way she conducted the sessions. There is a certain quiet strength in her persona which I found reflected in the protagonist of this book. I had won her first book The Reluctant Detective from the publishers in a contest held at Twitter and did not really like it much, and was a bit apprehensive about this one, but some of that apprehension was washed away by the aforementioned meeting ( I didn't know that it was just her second book when I got it) and rest after reading it.

Anyway coming back to Once Upon A Crush- so why would you pick this one? Well, for two reasons- witty dialogues and the portrayal of Rayna's struggle and its resolution as a single child of ageing parents, a woman of our times and a girl looking for love!

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A special note of thanks to the team at BlogChatter for sending the copy of this book my way under their Book Review programme.
Location: Kolkata, West Bengal, India

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