HaBO: Heroine’s Sister Really into Austin Powers

You did it! We figured this one out! It is a truth universally acknowledged (by me for certain) that the Bitchery pretty much knows everything, and really, it's true. Scroll down to see the solution for this HaBO - and many thanks!

This HaBO comes from K, who is looking for a contemporary romance:

I’m looking for a book that I read sometime around 2006 or 2007. I’m under the impression it was a relatively new release at the time, but I could be wrong. It was a contemporary, and the heroine was either Indian or Indian-American. Girlfriend was of Indian descent and living in America, is what I’m getting at, and I think it was California, specifically.

She makes her living as a modern-day matchmaker, and has the ability to “see threads” between people who are compatible (not in a paranormal sense, but more in the sense that she’s just good at her job and can tell when two people have a genuine connection). Her mom, of course, is like, “Omg, my daughter’s a matchmaker, but can SHE, HERSELF, find a nice man, settle down, and get married? OF COURSE NOT.” (Despite this, I don’t actually recall her relationship with her mother being all that bad. I think the whole “why can’t YOU get married?” chestnut was treated more as just a Mom Thing, as opposed to something to genuinely stress over.) She also has at least one sister, younger I’m pretty sure, who is really into Austin Powers, and as such, is occasionally given to using words like “groovy” and “shagadelic.”

The hero is some big-wig from India (I think he owns a company, or inherited one, or something?) who hires the heroine to find a wife for his younger brother (I think). Only none of the matches the heroine comes up with are good enough, and omg, dude is so arrogant and impossible to please she could just slap him, and mmmhmm, y’all know where this is going.

I don’t actually recall how the H and h get together at the end (the brother, I recall, hits it off with one of the h’s white friends, and it’s like OMG, I WAS SUPPOSED TO HOOK HIM UP WITH A NICE OLD-FASHIONED INDIAN GIRL AND INSTEAD HE’S GOT ALL THIS CHEMISTRY WITH THE BLONDE WHITE CHICK, OMG, WHAT DO), but I do remember there was a tiny bit of angst surrounding the H and h’s relationship, because she’s in the US, and he’s only temporarily there, and set to go back to India, and what will they do, where will they live, etc., etc. This issue must have been dealt with in a relatively realistic and non-stabby fashion, though, otherwise I probably would have remembered it, if only because it presumably would have left a bad taste in my mouth.

I want to say the H had a Mr. Darcy vibe about him, but I might be confusing things with “Bride and Prejudice.” But I’m pretty sure he at least had that “arrogance disguising how much of an awkward dork he is” thing going on.

So…HaBO? I remember this as being a really fun and sweet read (I plowed through it in one evening) and would love to read it again!

We need to find this book. Stat. Because I want to read it and I guarantee a bunch of Bitchery members are all about this business.