Samaya in How to Win A Breakup:#BlogchatterA2Z

This year too, I decided to write about something I relate to the most. I didn’t do a theme reveal because I wanted to create a special surprise moment with everyone. So here goes.

My A to Z this year will feature fictional characters from movies, books, and series. I’ve chosen to put special emphasis on the fact that they are fictional because, though we often find them deeply relatable, they are, at the end of the day, not real.

That’s why this year, I’ve titled my series The A to Z of Never Never Land.

I start with the letter S: Samaya from the young adult novel How to Win a Breakup by Farah Heron.

The story follows our protagonist, Samaya, as she carefully plots her revenge against her ex-boyfriend who dropped her suddenly like an old purse, never looking back.

Samaya was an absolute treat to read, thanks to her vibrant personality and strong, distinctive identity. She is a brilliant maths whiz who is passionately into gaming, yet she remains deeply emotional and sensitive at the same time. As I turned the pages, all I could think about was how incredibly cool she was. To me, she quickly became an icon.

What I loved most was that she wasn’t written as meek or forced into any tired stereotype. Even though she worked hard chasing top marks and good grades, she never lost her emotional maturity or depth of feeling.

Samaya was heartbroken, a Canadian Muslim girl with Indian roots, but she stayed unapologetically herself while still allowing herself to be beautifully vulnerable.

Farah Heron never portrayed Samaya as an infamous “tomboy.” Instead, she beautifully showed that a girl can be exceptionally good at studies, madly in love with someone, and completely obsessed with video games—all at once.

Reading about her extraordinary energy and the serious focus she brought to every gaming battle felt so refreshing and empowering.

On top of everything, she also had an amazing sense of style and totally rocked every outfit she wore.

Samaya along with the author Farah Heron gave me belief that we as girls/women have power to break out of this BOX the society puts us in.

This post is a part of Blogchatter A2Z Challenge 2026

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Every Conversation Matters: The blurring lines of mystery and thrillers #PlotTwistBlogHop

I don’t remember the last time I didn’t enjoy a domestic thriller or a murder mystery. I have been actively reading both genres for 28 years. As time flew by, I started enjoying the subgenres of Mysteries and Thrillers. The most attractive subgenre for me was murder mystery and domestic thrillers. These two always had me by the throat. I couldn’t get my eyes off the book. I’m known to ignore calls and messages while reading these subgenres. (Sometimes a work call too)😛

Today for World Book Day ECM #PlotTwistBlogHop I will tell you of three major points that make these two sub-genres stand out for me.

World-Buiding

Now you must be thinking that’s the basic that every mystery and thriller books have. Which is not entirely true. A good murder mystery and domestic thriller doesn’t open it’s cards out front. These two sub-genres keep the characters on the front and give a past to the protagonists keeping in mind how these characteristics will get connected to the main plot. 

An example is the opening of a recent book I read “The Jasmine Murders” where the book opens with an intrguing one line but what follows is the foggy introduction of the protagonists and what the two are doing in that space. We don’t know them,we get introduced to the world of the book categorically through the main characters. As you go further in the book,you see the world through the eyes of the characters, not just making you addicted to the plot but also wonder about what’s their fate going to be in the end.

Detective-lens writing

This isn’t something I have come up with. It does exist in every good murder mystery and Domestic thriller. There is suspicion but then there is a lens that the narrator looks at the scenario in front of you. The precision is what makes you go ahead in the plot and doesn’t let you drop the book. It rather makes a detective out of you. There are things that you start noticing on your own and the author successfully makes you,the reader, part of the mystery or the domestic thriller. I want to show an example of the detective lens writing from the book “The Jasmine Murders”. Don’t miss the image below.

Then comes the final and most important aspect that ties the entire plot together and that’s the slow burn. The pacing. 

Pacing

There definitely are people who might disagree with me. But for a traditionalist like me, the pacing cannot be fast. These days we want our thrillers to be fast-paced, and that’s not what makes me enjoy the murder mystery or the domestic thriller. The pacing has to simmer. Many readers feel like it is dragging, and I respectfully disagree. Thrillers, especially domestic thrillers, need to wrap up everything neatly. Only then can we finally understand the world we were brought into through the characters. The same goes for murder mysteries. Psychological thrillers and murder mysteries are often mixed. In the subgenre of murder mystery, it is about solving who the culprit is. In a psychological thriller, it is about figuring out the big WHY.

If I had to mention one “fast-paced thriller”, it might be “The Housemaid”, but it’s a forgettable psychological thriller. That’s why domestic thrillers always call me towards them. The Housemaid falls in the domestic thriller sub genre in fact and it’s a murder mystery. 

Have I given a spoiler? Though after reading some really good thrillers and mysteries,I have absolutely no idea why the show/movie was made on the book. There is absolutely nothing extraordinary about it. 

It’s maybe the thriller snob in me speaking,but there are just too many good thrillers to get adapted to.

But yes, these are two sub genres that I always enjoy because of these three components. 

What about you? Do you agree with me or disagree? Let me know your thoughts.

This post is a part of ‘Plot Twist Blog Hop’ hosted by Manali Desai and Sukaina Majeed under #EveryConversationMatters blog hop series

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