Review: "Better Catch Up, Krishna Kumar" by Anahita Karthik

Better Catch Up, Krishna Kumar by Anahita Karthik
Published January 2026 via HarperCollins
★★★★

Krishna had a goal for her summer in India—get out of her comfort zone, have adventures, and obtain her first kiss so that she isn't the only first-year college student in the history of the universe to have Never Been Kissed status.

The problem, part I: Summer's almost over, and she's done, well...none of this.

The solution: a last-minute road trip from Mumbai to Goa, where her summer crush is attending a wedding and just might be down to give her that first kiss.

The problem, part II: The road trip involves Krishna's cousin Priti, who is her best friend turned enemy, as well as a boy who makes her question who she's interested in after all...

This is one of those 3.5-stars-or-4-stars-and-a-caveat books for me. I absolutely love seeing a classic YA road trip book that takes place somewhere other than the US or, for that matter, other western, heavily white countries. Karthik is originally from Pune (ohh, suddenly it makes more sense why Krishna & co. detour through Pune!), so she's writing from some experience, though her story is definitely not Krishna's. Better Catch Up, Krishna Kumar shows a side of India that I haven't seen a lot of in fiction or in the media; Krishna's cousins (and friends/acquaintances in India) are contemporary and urban teenagers; they're confident and adventurous; they're not interested in being pigeonholed. Most of the people I know from India (partner included) are older than the characters in this book and/or they grew up in smaller cities, where change is—as in smaller cities everywhere—slower.

Two things I would have liked to see: first, some of the dialogue is in Indian languages (Hindi, Marathi, etc.), and though there are footnote translations I'd have loved rough pronunciation as well; I can sound out just enough Devanāgarī to absolutely butcher it, and it would have been nice to know just how far off I was. Second, more descriptions of the food—there are many mentions of different dishes and how delicious they are, but unless it was something I was already familiar with there wasn't always much to go on in terms of figuring out what was what. But that being said: on both points, I'm aware that I'm writing this as a white person from the West; this book is being published for an American market, but it would be wildly unfair/US-centric of me to expect that everything be explained in more detail than an Indian or Indian-diaspora reader would need (as, I'm sure, much of it already has been without me noticing). So I can class both of those as "if I can look it up, who am I to complain?"

The caveat: Some of the characters are so often drama-llama-ding-dongs.* I know—they are teenagers, and is both their right and a rite of passage for them to be drama-llama-ding-dongs, but that didn't stop me from cringing a bit every time Krishna or Priti (but mostly Krishna) picked another fight. They do have their moments—e.g., Priti acknowledging that at some point being rude just became habit, and it might take some time for that to even out—but I could have used a little less drama at times, and a few fewer misunderstandings. (On the plus side: Krishna is well aware that at least part of her shifting attraction is down to teenage hormones, which entertained me quite a bit.)

I'll be curious to see the response from readers who are closer to the target age range and also those who have a closer understanding of contemporary India (and, more specifically, the experience of growing up in contemporary India) than I do, but this was a fun and fast read for me. I'd like to see more along these lines.

*I know the song uses lama, but I prefer the mental image of a really dramatic camelid.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.