Aurora Palit’s debut novel explores romance and culture

With the release of her debut novel Sunshine and Spice, Aurora Palit brings a fresh and culturally nuanced voice to the romance genre.

Originally from Red Deer, Palit completed her master’s degree in English literature at McMaster University. While she wrote occasionally as a kid, Sunshine and Spice is her first fully comprehensive novel.

The novel follows Naomi who lands a job rebranding a South Asian business. However, she lacks the cultural knowledge to succeed. In comes Dev, the business owner’s son. He agrees to help Naomi in exchange for the two to fake-date to avoid his match-making mother.

Palit explained that while the premise of the novel is fictional, the inspiration behind it came partly from personal experience. Palit’s parents are immigrants, and she described how she’s “a child of the diaspora.”

“These characters are totally fictitious. But, you write what you know. And that’s been my life, is growing up kind of between two worlds, so it was a natural thing to write about.”

In terms of the writing process, Palit explained that while she’s relatively new to writing fiction, she reads a lot of romance which made writing in the genre feel “natural.” She explained that the premise of Sunshine and Spice had been in the works for a while, but she began to write it when a coworker told her to “shut up and write the book.”

Palit describes the reception of her novel in the Edmonton literature scene

The story began to develop, and the concept grew as she continued to work on the novel.

“I really wanted to explore this idea of not being in touch with the culture you’re born into. [And] maybe feeling like an imposter in your own skin,” Palit said.

While Sunshine and Spice just came out, Palit mentioned how her second book is already in the works. It’s a standalone rom-com in the same universe as Sunshine and Spice, and is set to release some time in 2025.

Sunshine and Spice has been promoted by many Edmonton bookstores since its release earlier this month. Palit has attended book launches at Audrey’s, The Book Boudoir, and Magpie Books. While Palit’s novel has been circulating the Edmonton literary scene, she still is in disbelief about it.

“[People] really connected with the story and the characters. But as far as kind of feeling like the book is out there and people are reading it, it’s still early, I think. It hasn’t quite hit me.”