Reviews
Readers' Favorite
I’m so glad I read this book. It was honest and easy to read. Bella and Rami were complex, both as a couple and as individuals. Their emotions are messy at times, but that authenticity gave the story weight. ...I have never read a story set in India before, so I found myself interested in the author’s descriptions of the country, as well. Anyone looking for a coming-of-age love story with a more grown-up edge will want to read this.
Unconventional, courageous, intimate, and—at times—defiant ... In a heart-wrenching work of autofiction, Isobel de Border explores the deepest recesses of these two lovers’ emotions over years of hope and decades of desperation.
What gives Bella & Rami its lasting force is de Border’s commitment to memory in all its untidy forms. The novel is confessional, reflective, and often intensely private, but its broader subject is the way a life changes when the past is revisited instead of simply remembered... Bella & Rami is a novel about first love becoming part of a lifetime, about the stories people construct from incomplete knowledge, and about the possibility that returning to the past with greater understanding can transform what that past means.
In her debut novel "Bella and Rami," Isobel de Border gifts us with an authentic tale of love... With a sprinkle of humor and a dash of nostalgia, de Border's raw emotional writing style captures the magic of first love and the sweet chaos it brings.
One of the book’s strengths is de Border’s treatment of culture. India and Australia are not just backdrops for the action, but essential parts of the characters themselves.
A sweeping international romance... that follows two star-crossed lovers across continents and decades, Isobel de Border’s Bella & Rami captures the intensity of first love and the still-hot embers of lifelong passion decades later.