Heart Breaker

Saachi loves debate. Her father says she should be a lawyer, like her mother was, but since Saachi’s mother seemingly abandoned her and her little brother, who was then a baby, eight years ago, without explanation, Saachi wants nothing to do with Law as a career, despite being fascinated with it.

When the most popular boy at their Sixth Form, Fahim, dumps Saachi’s long-standing, best friend, Mona, Saachi decides she will exact revenge on Fahim by tricking him into falling in love with her and then breaking his heart, as he broke Mona’s.

Will this plan work? And what will it reveal to Saachi and her friends? And is Fahim as arrogant as he seems?

At the beginning, Saachi is an unusual, appealing romantic lead who is studious and wary of love and driven by anger ostensibly directed towards Fahim. Saachi’s sarcasm and having an answer for everything makes her initial mistakes understandable but when she does end up falling in love, she abandons her friends and lies about it, becoming a very unappealing character. The twist in the tale, however, is the sensitivity with which Hussain explores the reasons for Saachi’s mother’s abandonment of her family.

This will be affirming to any reader whose family has experienced mental illness and, specifically, post partem depression, a rare and brave inclusion in a YA novel.