Find Someone to Love

by Divya Sood

Overview

Set in the surprisingly charming world of New York City opticians, Find Someone to Love follows Priya, a young optician working for a Queens practice full of characters. There’s Sam, whose life revolves around his store, 20/20. There’s Ed, who always loves a good snack and has a mysterious past. And then there is Dr. Bello, who is a colorful woman, to say the least.

Things in Priya’s world get turned upside down when Dr. Bello is replaced by a new optometrist, who is an unexpected, but beloved, blast from her past. Priya’s routine world changes when she has to answer questions of herself she was always too afraid to ask.

With a mixture of humor and heartache, Find Someone To Love explores the power of the past and the ephemeral nature of the present, the redemptive power of love, and the bonds of friendship.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781626015036
Publisher:	Riverdale Avenue Books
Publication date:	05/28/2019
Pages:	264
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.60(d)

Editorial Reviews

2021-06-01
An Indian optician living in New York City comes to terms with the fact that she’s gay in Sood’s novel.

The story opens in Queens with Priya, a woman with a master’s degree in English who later became “mesmerized by the world of optics.” Currently, she’s mourning the death of her cousin, Prem. As the family prepares to scatter Prem’s ashes into the Ganges in India, she reflects on the tight bond she shared with her cousin and the secrets they shared. Born a day apart in the same hospital in Calcutta, Prem remained in India, a closeted gay man who married and became a father before taking his own life; Priya, meanwhile, relocated to New York, where she fell for fellow student Leyla, only for her love to be unrequited. Priya now works at 20/20 Optical, where her mundane daily life involves awkward interactions with customers and coping with her quirky colleagues—Sam, the owner, who sees the business as his “lifeblood,” and Ed, a lazy yet gifted optician with a mysterious past. Priya’s world is thrown into turmoil when Leyla is unexpectedly hired as 20/20’s new doctor and reveals that she now has a husband. It’s unusual to set a novel in an optician’s store, but Sood makes it work brilliantly, as its workers are endearing and sharply observed, as when Priya describes Sam: “He struck me as someone who didn’t just open a business but poured himself into it.” The narrative is punctuated with precise optician-speak (“rimless frames with hi-index lenses in a minus six or six and a quarter”); however, the crackle of jargon is offset by Priya’s tender inner thoughts, which Sood relates poetically: “what had broken my spirit was that I loved her.” The novel also offers moments of poignant, powerful dialogue along the way: “ ‘We could be in a different place.’ I said. ‘If people just talked about it.’ ” Readers seeking a neat resolution to the story may be mildly dissatisfied, but this makes Priya’s emotional journey no less gripping.

Observant, stirring writing that explores the challenges of openness.

Kirkus Reviews