Review: Karma Under Fire

What kind of girl doesn’t love a good “enemies to lovers” storyline? Put a multicultural twist on it, and I’m hooked. That’s exactly what author Love Hudson-Maggio delivers in this fun, quick romp of a read about an American girl on a quest to start a jewelry business who meets an hot up-and-coming Indian chef. Both of them are in the process of being set up by their parents with arranged marriages — neither of which they’re excited about or even know about for a little while. They meet when Tej Mayur actually fires Harlow Kennedy from an account she’s working on at a lame job she doesn’t like. After her firing, she figures she’ll plan the rest of her life after taking a break from life while visiting India, where her best friend is getting married. But lo and behold, she gets on the plane and finds herself sitting next to Tej. It is uncomfortable and awkward, but ultimately they can’t stop thinking of each other. When her friend’s wedding doesn’t turn out exactly as planned, it makes Harlow rethink the entire notion of love and marriage. Meanwhile, Tej has zero interest in the marriage his parents surprise him with. Tej and Harlow spend a lot of time together, putting each other through tests and games. But the whole time, they are well aware of what they really want. Are they willing to reach out and grab it though?

The cat-and-mouse game becomes a little annoying, especially when Harlow agrees to let Tej set her up on dates with other men. And why is she suddenly so open to a possible arranged marriage when her mother is trying to set one up for her at home, and she has no interest in that one? I also found myself wondering how many American girls are really subjecting themselves to arranged marriages in the States these dates? There were several plotholes that threw me, but the love story and connection between the two main characters got me in the end. It is karma after all.

Movie vs. Book: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

As the prequel to The Hunger Games series, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is a fun origin story on the evil of Coriolanus Snow, who essentially develops the modern-day Hunger Games that is then ended (spoiler alert!) in the final book of the series. The movie adaptation of this prequel novel does a pretty good job of sticking to the story, which is long. The fun surprise of both is that the Hunger Games only make up the first half of the story, but there is much more to develop afterward. Here are the few differences the movie does make from the novel.

1. The movie allowed Lucy Gray to finish her “performance” at the reaping
   • In the movie, when Lucy Gray has her name called at the reaping ceremony, she take the stage and performs. She is allowed to complete her performance because the audience is so awestruck by her talent and charm. In the novel, however, the evil of the people in charge of the Games shines through, as she is dragged off the stage, mid-performance.
2. No funerals for killed mentors :
   • In both the book and movie, a bunch of mentors for the Hunger Games are killed before the Games even begin. In the novel, each of the mentors killed are honored in a proper funeral, which delay the start of the Hunger Games. The funerals are eliminated from the movie.
3. Clemensia isn’t seen again after being bit by the snakes
   • As part of the torturing of the mentors in the story, one of them, Clemensia, is bitten by snakes. Coriolanus Snow’s relationship with Clemensia is complicated, as are many of his relationships in the novel. He sees her in the hospital as he recovers from his own injuries, but avoids visiting her as she recovers in the hospital. He eventually apologizes to her, and they reconcile, but the instance emphasizes the damage caused by the snakes. Much of this is eliminated from the movie.
4. Explanation and severity of the snakes
   • Speaking of the snakes, their power and the damage they inflict is a bit of a mystery in the novel. Corio has to figure out what they do and how they operate and harm people so that he can use that as a tactic to help Lucy Gray later in the games. But in the movie, Dr. Gaul outright explains to him and the other mentors what the snakes do, which drops some of the creepy mystery of it all. The snakes also seem a little more severe in the film, in that Lucy Gray almost dies from them at the end of the Hunger Games. In the novel, her singing keeps them at bay. In the movie, her singing calms them a bit, but they continue to still move slowly up her body until the mentors convince those in charge to end the Hunger Games.
5. Cornucopia bloodbath
   • In the novel, the Hunger Games competitors die more slowly and one at a time. In the film, the start of the Hunger Games is a bloodbath — similar to that seen in the other books and movies — where the competitors fight over supplies and weapons and instantly kill many of each other just as the Games begin. The movie is clearly trying to speed the plot along here.
6. Love story between Lucy Gray and Snow
   • The biggest bummer to me is that the love story between Lucy Gray and Snow is much better and more believable in the book. I believe they kiss sooner in the novel, and because the book is told from Snow’s point of view, the reader is getting more insight into his strong feelings for Lucy Gray. That helps in making it difficult to see how evil he really is until the very end. In the film, the love story is not as heavy of a focus. This is not a problem for the romance, but for the evolution of Snow’s character. Because the viewer is not seeing him as infatuated with her, he seems evil from the start, so his dark actions at the end of the novel don’t appear to be that shocking or haunting.