[Audiobook Review] Love, Chai, and Other Four-Letter Words by Annika Sharma

I loved the relationships and representation in Love, Chai, and Other Four-Letter Words when I first read it. I'd originally received an ARC from Sourcebooks Casablanca - slow burn, cultural diversity, AND chai? What wasn't to love? I loved Kiran and Nash on the page, and definitely recommend the book - the first in Annika Sharma's Chai Masala Club series. Read my full review of the text here.

However, it took me a really long time to get into parts of the narration by Zehra Naqvi. The voice she used for Nash really grated on me at the beginning. I eventually got used to it, and a large part of my issue probably stemmed from knowing people from Nashville and knowing the twang wasn't exactly right, but I didn't love the voice she used for him and it distracted me every time he spoke. Every other accent (American, Indian, any of the others) were fine; it was just Nash's, and I was over 50% into the audiobook before his voice didn't annoy me. And Naqvi had a lot of accents to do; I respect that and the work she did and that's why I kept listening to the end. She certainly handled more accents that I could do, but I found myself wishing for dual narrators for Kiran and Nash since that was how the book was structured anyway.

I did read the text before embarking on the audiobook, but even if I had no experience with the story, I doubt I would have had any issues following along as the audiobook plot progressed. Each character was easy to pick out, and conversations were easy to follow. Even if Nash's voice irritated me a bit, I still think Naqvi did a wonderful job handling each character, injecting emotion into each question and discovery. While I gave the book a solid 4 stars, the audiobook is more of a 3.5 out of 5 for me.

A huge thank you to Dreamscape Media, Sourcebooks Casablanca, and Netgalley for providing an ALC of Love, Chai, and Other Four-Letter Words.