A Million to One

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They spend multi billions of our money annually on schools, housing, social services, roads, waste management, sport and leisure, environmental and public health, planning amongst many other day-to-day matters vital to us all. The importance of friendship is a very strong theme throughout this book and I really enjoyed how each of the four girls were so very different, with unique personalities. A countdown in the chapter headings adds a sense of urgency--will the girls succeed before time runs out? and suggesting changes that let readers experience things alongside the characters through showing rather than telling. It wasn’t like A Million to One was so long that this part of the plot needed to be cut down for time—it’s barely over 300 pages.

I almost threw my book across the room after reading that passage because it's so unbelievably stupid that Violet would believe that a Black girl in that time period would be privileged because she had finances and a good family. On the other hand, the other girls, Violet and Emilie, felt quite bland in comparison and I never became truly interested in their narratives. Any ignorance on the part of the crew and First-Class passengers is unsurprising however as it’s also true that Third-Class ticketholders were (are) usually billeted as immigrants, refugees, and refuse, reduced to dark complexed foreigners. I moved to the Sooner State when I was seventeen and met my soul mate and best friend not long after. It was a really quick read, perfect for a rainy day, a palate cleanser, a hopeless romantic mood read!Yet no amount of training or experience could prepare him for the latest twist in the investigation. These four young women are so incredibly well-drawn that you’re rooting for them to succeed in crime.

When we meet the four girls, they are living at a boardinghouse in Dublin which is run by a tough but fair local woman, Matron O’Neill. Hinnah was also one of my favourite characters and I found it particularly tense when she gets trapped in a room on the ship. And as with any leap of faith scenario, the level of trust they have in each other will determine the end result. Josefa, Hinnah, Violet and Emilie are four young girls who have had to adapt to some tough challenges in life. The majority of the novel ended up being a bunch of meaningless dithering about on the Titanic, which was intended to…build up the suspense, I supposed, but it felt like far too many pages of The Gang running around the ship, chatting with a boy or two, trying to throw the guards off their trail, and making no progress whatsoever.

Her ride-or-die on this heist, and in life, is Violet, a Croatian actress who could charm the pants off just about anyone she meets. A Million to One is about the power of sisterhood, the magic that happens when we connect across difference, and what it means to be an outsider.

And Yuri is Adiba’s specialty, understanding all too well the power and beauty of female relationships, as friends, co-conspirators, or otherwise. I sympathize with Hinnah on never feeling like she was enough or could be accepted for who she was, but if we don't get any insight into WHY her parents acted the way they did, the readers are left with the same old "my brown parents are oppressive" shit that the Western world loves to eat up and use as justification on why no woman would ever want to voluntarily choose modesty. And so his unique career journey would continue to unfold, encountering a seemingly endless succession of superlatives, larger-than-life characters and astonishing events. I was drawn to this book because I have always been interested in this nautical disaster and love reading fictionalised accounts.

Adiba Jaigirdar was born in Dhaka, Bangladesh, and has been living in Dublin, Ireland from the age of ten. Obviously there is much sadness and heartbreak, as the Titanic’s demise features in the final section of the book, but there is also a sense of fun and adventure throughout.

South Asian food comes with so much nuanced variety across each individual country alone (Pakistani food is diff from Bengali food which is diff from Indian food, etc); for someone to come from a region with a very unique flavor profile and cuisine, Hinnah could have elaborated more about the stark difference between Irish food and what she's used to. This here is an example where Jaigirdar could have given us so much more detail and cultural context. Although it’s also made me realise how quickly a contemporary book can be out of date – as Annie would be all over reels and Tik Tok now! Rob and I have been married for over twenty years and have a son--a mom proclaimed prodigy, of course! A countdown in the chapter headings adds a sense of urgency—will the girls succeed before time runs out?But careless mistakes, old grudges and new romances threaten to jeopardise everything they've worked towards.