AUGUST 2018 - AudioFile
Neel Patel narrates his short stories with a depth of feeling that draws listeners further into them. His characters are all first-generation Indian-Americans who are grappling with their identities and surroundings. At times, his delivery is muted, so subdued as to become a monotone across the characters, whose sadness can also be overwhelming. This is a volume that is best dipped into from time to time, at the listener's leisure, perhaps on rainy days or during contemplative moods. Patel brings us the stories of failed relationships and the promise of new beginnings. He deals gently with male and female characters, drawing out the pathos in their situations to elicit empathy from listeners. M.R. © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine
Publishers Weekly
05/14/2018
The 11 seemingly casual and quietly feverish stories in Patel’s debut follow the plight of young first- or second-generation Indian-Americans. Some characters are gay and some straight, but most of them have grown up in suburban Midwest towns where they are viewed as vaguely exotic as, in an effort to find love, they struggle to please or break away from their families. Expected to become doctors or lawyers, they often rebel in sneaky or ineffective ways. In the wrenching “Just a Friend,” 22-year-old bartender Jonathan falls for, and completely fails to understand, the much older, anxious immigrant Ashwin, who wears expensive clothes and conceals or lies about most of the details of his life. In the title story, the narrator and his older brother, Deepak, move from a close friendship to a state of war over the decades, as Deepak flunks out of a “marginally rated college,” joining his disappointed parents in running the motel they own, while the narrator goes to medical school. “World Famous” is told from the point of view of a member of an ill-fated couple: Ankur, a medical student from a wealthy family, is attracted to his former high school classmate Anjali, whose family is upwardly aspiring, but their relationship is doomed because of their class discrepancy. Patel has a knack for depicting the gap between how characters experience their lives and how they are expected to be seen—and how those gaps can widen into life-changing fractures. This is a perceptive, moving collection. (July)
From the Publisher
You won’t want to miss…Patel turns his lens on Indian-Americans, addressing with depth and care subjects that are often overlooked or made into caricature: helicopter parents, conflicts between spouses, sibling rivalry, racism, sexual orientation, and identity.”
—Vanity Fair (“Summer Reading: This Season’s Ultimate Fiction List”)
“Patel’s deep sense of empathy—and infuriatingly relatable characters—shines throughout. A melancholic pleasure with a sense of humor.”
—Kirkus (starred review)
“Patel explores universal themes in unexpected ways and excels at portraying nuanced characters in even the briefest stories. Readers in search of a fresh new voice should be on the lookout for Patel.”
—Booklist
“Wrenching…Patel has a knack for depicting the gap between how characters experience their lives and how they are expected to be seen—and how those gaps can widen into life-changing fractures. This is a perceptive, moving collection.”
—Publishers Weekly
"If You See Me, Don't Say Hi bristles with unexpected meetings and reunions, recognitions and failed recognitions, passions and estrangements of all kinds. These stories have a sharp eye for the complexities of modern life, but Neel Patel writes with the wisdom and compassion of an old soul."
—Celeste Ng, New York Times bestselling author of Little Fires Everywhere
“A joy to read, reminiscent of Jhumpa Lahiri and David Ebershoff. As much as these remarkable stories have Indian-American characters at the center, they are simply human, tenderly told. Without moralizing or sentimentality, Patel writes about forgiveness and compassion, and the freedom to be flawed. What exquisite writing. What a tremendous talent.”
—Imbolo Mbue, New York Times bestselling author of Behold the Dreamers
"It’s possible that no one ever told Neel Patel that Indians in America are supposed to be a model minority. How else to explain these stories, full of terrible spouses, warring siblings, unapologetic liars, and naive kids, searching for happiness, love, or maybe just sex? In stories that are moving, thoughtful, entertaining, and discomfiting all at once, Patel upends what we think the experience of Indians in America looks like. It’s about time."
—Rumaan Alam, author of Rich and Pretty
“In If You See Me, Don’t Say Hi, Neel Patel pulls off something that I’ve rarely seen: stories about Indians in America which feel unique and thrilling without relying on stereotypes or tropes. His characters manage to be both sympathetic and deeply flawed, complicated people who don’t give you clean answers. His stories will make you laugh, then cry, then feel uncomfortable, then feel free, all within a few pages. When you’re done reading, you’ll want to flip back to the beginning and read it all over again.”
—Scaachi Koul, author of One Day We’ll All Be Dead and None of This Will Matter
AUGUST 2018 - AudioFile
Neel Patel narrates his short stories with a depth of feeling that draws listeners further into them. His characters are all first-generation Indian-Americans who are grappling with their identities and surroundings. At times, his delivery is muted, so subdued as to become a monotone across the characters, whose sadness can also be overwhelming. This is a volume that is best dipped into from time to time, at the listener's leisure, perhaps on rainy days or during contemplative moods. Patel brings us the stories of failed relationships and the promise of new beginnings. He deals gently with male and female characters, drawing out the pathos in their situations to elicit empathy from listeners. M.R. © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2018-05-01
Always thoughtful and often aching, the 11 sharp stories in Patel's debut find his characters—mostly first-generation Indian-Americans; usually young, or youngish; often in Midwestern cities—navigating love, loss, and disappointment.In "god of destruction," which opens the collection, an unhappy interior designer has a one-night stand with the 22-year-old cable guy after a botched internet date. "No one ever told me that happiness was like a currency: that when it goes, it goes, and that few people are willing to give you some of theirs," she reflects. Later, she'll write the incident out of her history. In "just a friend," a 22-year-old college dropout meets a handsome married dentist at a Chicago gay bar only to find out, after a romantic weekend together, that the man isn't who he seems. The title story is both the simplest and the showstopper, about the troubled relationship between two brothers, told from the perspective of the high-achieving youngest, now a doctor. It's an empathetic family portrait, exquisitely subtle, without villains; their falling out, when it happens, triggered by a comment over a white girlfriend, is about nothing and also everything. The silence between them lasts for 10 years. The collection ends with an unexpected pair of linked stories following a boy and a girl who met as kids and again as adults, both of them having become items of community gossip. When they reconnect in their Illinois hometown, in his story, she's newly and scandalously divorced; he hasn't matched for a residency after medical school. Her story picks up years later, after both of them have achieved something like success. At the core of Patel's stories is a sense of loss, more powerful for its quiet restraint. Not every story is an equal knockout, which is a hazard of the format, but Patel's deep sense of empathy—and infuriatingly relatable characters—shines throughout.A melancholic pleasure with a sense of humor.
