• Title  – It Had to Be You
• Author – Anuj Tiwari
• Publisher – Rupa Publications
• Genre – Fiction
• Pages – 198
• ISBN – 978-81-291-3107-2
• Price – 140 INR

Blurb on the Book – What if you don’t get what you want from life? Do you learn to live with its terms and conditions?

Anuj, a young professional, is just getting by from day to day when the beautiful and vivacious Pakhi walks into his life and turns it upside down. Love blossoms and Anuj knows she is the one for him. But when all is going well, Pakhi unexpectedly leaves, causing him to lose his faith in love and happy endings.

To shake off his depression and restart his life, he heads to Mumbai where he meets new people—the stunning Meera; rom-com specialist Vishal; the man of reasons, Rahim Chacha; and the lovely Anushka. With their help, he begins to put his past behind him but Fate intervenes. Will he be able to find the answers he desperately seeks and finally get closure or does life have other plans?

Review – The book has a beautiful cover that speaks well of it being a novel full of love. The book begins with the protagonist recovering from depression post a break up. As the story unfolds the plot becomes predictable and loses steam owing to abundance of mistakes in grammar, tense and worse still even in spellings on a few occasions.

The narration has its definite ups in the philosophical lines that have been generously used throughout, which at times (especially in the letters) have robbed the impact a well written love-letter could have had.

Beautiful poems adorn the book at various points which add to the beauty of the book.

” I feel alone and left out, full of sadness and loneliness.

Your absence is slowly consuming my life and killing my soul day by day.

Is life all about suffering? Is life all about struggle?

Is life all about earning money and not happiness?

Am I happy without her? Is she happy without me?

Shall we meet again?”

The biggest dip in the narration is the haphazard flow of thoughts with abrupt jumps and difficult-to-accept-logically explanations given to justify the abrupt twists in the plot.

The book derives inspiration from Eric Segal’s Love Story, Cecilia Ahern’s P.S. I love you and many other romance bestsellers but fails to create an impact. The book comes across as a poor compilation of thoughts that could have made for a better read if the characters in the book were given enough space to evolve.

I failed to understand why every girl described in the book has been described to have blue eyes even when they are all Indians (I do understand Meera’s case- the American Indian being an exception).

“One day we all have to sleep, so let’s work hard till the day we breathe. You’ve got twenty-four hours and I’ve got my own watch.”

The ending is hasty and fails to make an impact. I failed to approve to the way conservative Indian parents of the protagonist and the family of his lady love have been shown to behave towards the end of the book.

The book makes for a breezy read and would perhaps make for a good travel companion.

About the Author – Anuj Tiwari works with a prominent IT company. He lives in Mumbai and works with NGO’s over the weekends. “I have tasted the water of many fountains,” He avows. “Some were sweet, and some sour.” JOURNEY OF TWO HEARTS! –will be cherished forever is his debut novel. 

Anuj Tiwari is a motivational speaker as well after learning from life now, he delivers the voice from heart very easily and simply to the youth. He is awarded as the youngest youth icon with his very simple and effective thoughts.

Rating – 2/5