the love of her life

Mentioned before, chick-lit, not my favourite read no. The cover of this book by Harriet Evans should have been enough to put me off buying it I suppose, but I had read a few nice notes about it and thought I'd give it a go - and a bit more love in our lives most of us do need.

And even if I'm not exactly running out to get another book by the same author, or it being all that likely I'll ever read anything else by her at all, it was a rather enjoyable, simple, relaxing 457 pages read. Not brimming with (too many) genre cliches, not a writer trying too hard to be witty, pretentious, aiming too high, not an awfully lot about being too fat and annoying appearance obsession.

Some memorable passages, some lovely walks through London - I do very much enjoy when one gets to follow the character by street and areas, to restaurants and shops and all the comparisons London vs New York.

Also the kind of book one can safely read before lights out at night without having your sleep disturbed. And that's not to be wrinkly nosed at, and not a minor thing really.

I thought the last quarter of "the love of her life" got slightly lengthy and overall the book would probably have improved with being shortened about 100 or so pages.

One of my favourite bits in the book did occur in that very last quarter of it though, chapter 41, when the main character got that urge to talk, talk to strangers about more or less insignificant details of her life, of things, just to vent, just to get a complete stranger's view on the matter. I too get such urges sometimes. But I never act on them, of course I don't...