One Hundred Shades of White
by Preethi Nair

Maya, her mother Nalini, and her brother Satchin have left a carefree life in India to come to England. But when Maya’s father disappears, leaving only deceit and debt behind, they are left to fend for themselves in a strange, damp land. Maya, though, doesn’t know of her father’s betrayal. Nalini, determined to preserve her children’s pride, tells them that their father died in an accident and, as their struggle to make a life begins, whole realities are built on this lie. But even a white lie cannot remain hidden forever—and when the truth resurfaces, it changes everything

The title refers to that lie — that husband/father Raul dies a hero’s death rescuing a young boy from the path of an oncoming car; the truth is that Raul had a second family in America and deserted Nalini and the children in London. Nalini muses:

My mother said that to lie is the coward’s way and that truth is whole, like black or white. But what if there are a hundred shades for truth?

Not knowing the truth about her father leads Maya to think in a certain way about her life, her relationships and her mother’s relationships. When she learns the truth, her world shifts beneath her.

I thought the characters of Nalini and Maya were well-developed and the contrast between the warm, fragrant, familiar life in India and the cold, plain, foreign way of life in England was made very clear.

There’s a decent story in this book, which is told alternately through the eyes of mother Nalini and daughter Maya. BUT the book is rife with spelling, grammatical and structural errors that were serious distractions from the plot. Nair’s editors let her down big-time on this one.

I would normally have given this book 3.5 stars (out of five) but I can’t really recommend it as it stands. I’ll have to give it 2.5 out of 5 stars.

Reading Challenges: 100 Shades satisfies four of my reading challenges: the Colorful Challenge, the New To Me Authors Challenge, the Support Your Local Library, and 100+.

Chapters/Indigo link for Canadian readers:
One Hundred Shades Of White

Or, even better, buy from an independent book seller by searching this site that has links to independent booksellers across North America.

P.S. If you click through the affiliate links in the book titles, you may notice a different cover. I like to see the cover that’s on the copy I read – and it’s usually different than Amazon.com because they display the American release, and I read the Canadian. Again, the links are affiliate links so I will receive a small percentage of any purchase you make after clicking through from this blog.

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