 Hi guys, it's Hannah and today I will be reviewing a book that kind of broke me, that broke the way I see the world, and that really left me in, let's say, emotionally not stable place. And that book is Girls Burn Brighter by Chopin Rao. I don't really know how to pronounce the name. This book came out on 6th of March. And even though it is a little bit marketed as a voyeur, story about two girls coming of age, two girls discovering this friendship between two girls. This is not that kind of book. I mean, yes, this book essentially is about two girls, Purnima and Savita, and about the friendship. But it is so much more beyond that. So, it's set in India. And actually these two girls, they belong to the lowest caste in India. So, for me, all the people from India that I know personally, both in Germany and when I lived in UK, they are all pretty rich because to get out of India, to live abroad, to study, or to own a company or to work abroad, you have to have a lot of money. And I never knew this poverty. I knew that India is a poor country and that people suffer. I never knew such level of poverty is even possible. So, you know, like we, what we think in a Western world of poverty, when we see people that are homeless or collecting bottles or looking at the trash bins for food, this in comparison to what is described in this book, what this book is about, is almost luxury because the poverty this book deals with, it, I don't know how to describe it, is the people in these hoods, they live, it's not even slums, it's beyond that. There is no fresh water. There is no electricity. They all sleep in the same room. They all cook in the same room. The food is always rice. And if you're even poorer than these people, you eat like, when Purmina goes with Savita to her home and Savilla is much poorer than Purmina, I don't think, I mean, I thought it's not even possible. But she sees, spoiled some vegetables like an onion and that she knew that that was the food of the family for the whole week. And when you think about it, it's, it's incredibly crazy. So these girls, of course, they have no education and they go into this orange marriage, which so what the author did in this book really well was the fact that she wrote in the beginning that it was 2001. I was born at that time, of course, I was already, like, growing up at that time. And I can really, really, you know, I know what is happening in that time, what we had and what is described in these books, how these girls, when they start to bleed after that, like their work is to cook and clean for the men. And they are not even considered as children, as kind of children, when the father, like, so there's this point in the book. So I'm not gonna try to talk about specific characters, because I don't want to really spoil, but there's something to talk in general about, because there are different things happening, not just to these two girls. And basically, there's an accident where a girl runs little, runs to the water, and the father runs after her to save her. But the last minute when he sees that she can be taken, like taken away by the water, he stops thinking that, just let go, it's only a girl. Because girls don't have no way to give dowry, like basically sell to whoever takes them. And then they're taken by their husband, they're supposed to be grateful, but it's really, they're taken as a servant. And this story is so heartbreaking. It's not just a really low caste life of them, the culture, but it's... So the whole idea is that these girls meet as kids, like as teenagers, and then after four years they meet again. But things that happen is four years. So this book deals with slavery, with the brothers, where girls are kept drugged. So basically the way... So they can be either that the family sells the girls, the daughters, to pay off the debts, or just for food or something, to the brothers, or they abducted from the street. Basically they drugged, they taken in in a brothel, and they get addicted to drugs, so they make sure that they get addicted to the drug, and then they do anything to get that drug, because of the trouble. And of course in that time the, like I don't know, handle of the brother, they check if there's any family rich enough to care or look for them. If not, they keep these girls, and then they sell them, they do whatever. And at some point you get to these parts where these girls don't have anything, and I'm talking to no. And they start selling off the body parts, because they don't have anything. And also they eventually end up, some of them in the USA, they are imported, like bought, and to supposedly clean houses, but we both know it's not really the purpose of it only, so they become slaves, and how they can't really escape, because they have passwords, they don't even know what is the password, they don't speak English, and it's so heartbreaking. Like it's so freaking heartbreaking. And the worst part is, okay, so they assault by the parents to the husband, and then when the husband doesn't like they can just throw him out, or do even worse things to them, and they can't tell anybody. Apparently this is what is society. And the worst part is that it's actually so these girls know each other for a few years, and then they suffer unspeakable things, and they mitigate. And because the author said the time period in the beginning, it's really easy to put together what is happening in the world that you grow up at the time, and what these girls are going through. It's just heartbreaking. I haven't read the book that broke me this much. So I read this, I started last night, and I finished just a few minutes ago, because I just, I wanted to record my feelings for you, instead of, you know, putting together a nice review and encouraging you to read. I wanted to try to put out the real feelings I have for it, and I know it has been promoted by a few book to birth, but I think this book should really be read. Because your problems, I mean of course your problems become not so big anymore when you read this, and then after a while you forget about the book, and then you again, I like your big problems like what should be here or something, you know. But what this book really taught me was that look around you, because this is happening today, and yes, you don't know, you can't really change anything that's happening in India to these girls, but they are being bought in the ship to Dubai, or to USA or other countries to slave, and you meet them in the airport, you go past them, and you go past them on a street, like when one of the girls was running away, in USA she tried at least. There were some people, like she can't talk obviously, and she just knows one place where she's going, and people don't understand her show, so they ignore her when she asks them, tries to ask them, they just think that she is like begging for money, or wants to sell herself, you know, or she's just being mean to Mexico, because apparently some people can't tell the difference between India and Mexico, but yeah, and then like these people, they are assaulted, they are treated like nothing, and not like people, and it's just horrible, it's so horrible. I haven't read anything based in India, people like, because this is literal fiction, so the author knows what she's writing about, and it was really heartbreaking, really heartbreaking to read. I know it's not really review, I don't know what this is, but I want to just put my feelings out there for you, and maybe this will convince you to read this book, because it's one of these books that will gonna stay with you forever, I think. It's like something that you're gonna reflect, yes it's heartbreaking, it's hard to read, but at the same time it really shows you a lot, and I also think it was amazing to learn about the real India, and not just the part you are shown, and told about the people you know with pools, and servants, and all that. Like the girls, they haven't seen cinema, they haven't seen it to be, they don't know about the film, they don't know what is passport, so I think this already says a lot about what kind of characters we are talking about. So yeah, even though this book is targeted to way young adults, audience, I think it should be targeted to everybody, because I know a lot of people think, oh it's way, I'm not gonna read this, it's gonna be silly, I think it should be targeted to in general people who read, instead of just making, oh it's a way book, because it felt give, it believed everything leader, just sitting there and thinking wow, what did I just read? Like it changes you, it changes on so many levels, and yeah, that's pretty much it I guess. I'm sure I'm gonna have many many thoughts after this, but as I said I wanted to record my original feelings. I don't think you can even read this book, because even though yes, it's a fictional story, I know it's a story of many girls who went through this, and I think you can't really read a life that they have to go through, so just for the sake of it, I give it 5 out of 5 stars, but in general this book is not equal to any other like entertaining fiction that I read that I gave 5 stars, I think this book is way above that, and it just leaves you feeling many things, and it changes you and shapes you and I hope you can end up reading it, so yeah, that is pretty much it, and I'll see you next video, bye!