Attachments

Jan 29, 2013 Ashley rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: addictive, favorites, fiction, girly, nostalgia

Falling in love with a book is exactly like falling in love with a person. In both cases, most of the time you just can’t help yourself, and what happens during the falling is almost entirely out of your control. This is an especially appropriate metaphor to be making when talking about Rainbow Rowell’s delightful little book, Attachments, which is about a man falling in love in a very inappropriate way. This is what I wrote on Goodreads approximately one minute and thirty-one seconds after fini...more Falling in love with a book is exactly like falling in love with a person. In both cases, most of the time you just can’t help yourself, and what happens during the falling is almost entirely out of your control. This is an especially appropriate metaphor to be making when talking about Rainbow Rowell’s delightful little book, Attachments, which is about a man falling in love in a very inappropriate way. This is what I wrote on Goodreads approximately one minute and thirty-one seconds after finishing the last page at 2 AM on Saturday night:

“FUCKING HELL, MAN. Why is this so . . . GUH . . . and it’s the middle of the night and I’M SO ALONE.”

I believe that sentence and my five star rating should speak for itself, but I would like to elaborate anyway because when you fall in love with something you want to tell everybody about it as loudly and in as many ways as possible.

Attachments takes place in 1999, just before the turn of the millennium and all the madness of Y2K (remember Y2K? It was like practice for the Mayan apocalypse!). Twenty-eight year old perpetual student Lincoln is fresh off his latest graduate degree and is stuck in a rut in basically every area of his life: he lives with his mother, he has no foreseeable career objectives (he can’t even figure out what it is that he might be good at), he has no social life to speak of excepting Saturday night games of D&D with his lifelong friends, and he hasn’t even attempted a romantic relationship since his heart was smashed into pieces eight years before by the girl he thought he’d be with forever.

As the novel opens, Lincoln has just taken a job in a Nebraska newspaper’s IT department where he is in charge of the newly developed email security program that monitors employee’s email accounts for inappropriate usage. It’s a bit of a creepy job reading other people’s emails and sending them warnings, not to mention tedious and boring, but it’s at least a job. He spends most of his time reading books and doing other non work-related activities. That is, until he accidentally becomes wrapped up in the correspondence of two employees, film critic Beth and copyeditor Jennifer, who are smart and funny and who little by little begin treating their work email accounts as a personal chat service. After about the fourth or fifth flagged conversation, Lincoln realizes it’s too late to send them a warning and with not a little guilt begins looking forward to each flagged email, especially when it becomes clear to him that not only is he developing feelings for Beth, but she has a little crush on him as well. The only problem is, if he wants to be with her, how can he do so knowing that he’s just spent a ridiculous amount of time violating her personal privacy?

The novel is a mix between Lincoln’s 3rd person POV and a delightful modern epistolary confection consisting of Jennifer and Beth’s increasingly personal emails to one another. Jennifer and Beth are immediately very likeable. Their conversations with one another are funny and warm and occasionally sort of surprisingly heart-rending. That they were so likeable is key, because the novel wouldn’t have worked if we as readers were not able to overcome the basic creepiness of Lincoln’s actions. We want Lincoln to keep reading about Jennifer and Beth because WE want to keep reading about Jennifer and Beth. His actions as Rowell writes them, while a bit icky, are also completely understandable. There’s also the fact that Lincoln himself is a wonderful character, and I quickly found myself wishing he was real because I have been looking for him all my life. But it’s not only that he’s likeable. His struggles as an aimless and confused young adult unsure of what he wanted to do with himself was one I could relate to in very specific ways. The sharp wit of Rowell’s dialogue and prose doesn’t hurt, either. This was also the perfect time period to set this book. The transition from tradition to technology at the newspaper echoes Lincoln’s own stumbling transition to adulthood.

This is probably not a book many other readers will give five stars to, but it hit all of my personal buttons in all the right ways. Like, to the point where I was all, Rainbow Rowell, either get out of my head or be my best friend. But even if you don’t fall crazy in love and over-identify with it like I did, it’s still worth checking out as the perfect example of this kind of romancey, character-driven novel. It’s well-written, funny, has great characters, and is overall a super-fun read. If you like good romantic comedies like When Harry Met Sally and Love, Actually, just imagine that this is like a book version of that and you’ll have a pretty good idea. I am now eagerly anticipating the two (!) books Rainbow Rowell is publishing later this year.(less)

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Dec 02, 2011 Noelle rated it 4 of 5 stars

Recommended to Noelle by: Maggie

Shelves: reviewed, it-s-so-fluffy-i-m-gonna-die

My office’s IT support guy has a blonde ponytail and once serenaded me with an Enrique Iglesias song while I was stuck at the copy machine waiting for a fax to go through. He was INTO IT. He was acting like it was some deep, deep rock anthem that TOUCHED HIS SOUL. Air acoustic guitar was involved. I did what any normal person would do: studiously avoided eye contact and went directly back to my desk to email my work best friend about it.

Actual email excerpt:

Me: I just got "I will be your hero,

...more My office’s IT support guy has a blonde ponytail and once serenaded me with an Enrique Iglesias song while I was stuck at the copy machine waiting for a fax to go through. He was INTO IT. He was acting like it was some deep, deep rock anthem that TOUCHED HIS SOUL. Air acoustic guitar was involved. I did what any normal person would do: studiously avoided eye contact and went directly back to my desk to email my work best friend about it.

Actual email excerpt:

Me: I just got "I will be your hero, baby"-ed by tech support.
Friend: I'm pretty sure HR frowns on that.
Me: I'm pretty sure they frown on any mention of trembling.
Friend: But do they know what it feels like loving someone that's in a rush to throw them away?
Me: Do they know? Do they know? Do they know? Do they?

And then we watched this video ten times and laughed until we forgot how much our jobs suck.

Ahem. ANYWAYS. As you might guess, I thought this book was so freaking charming! It's based in the late 90s and told from the perspective of Lincoln, who starts off the book leading a pretty pathetic, lonely existence. He has no social interaction that doesn't involve his mother or Dungeons and Dragons. He left a majority of his self-esteem sprinkled across the countryside on the long just-been-dumped-by-the-love-of-his-life bus ride home from college. He works the IT security night shift at the local newspaper, has no social skills and basically walks around in a beige, directionless haze.

But then, Beth and Jennifer's email chains get flagged in his security filters and Lincoln is immediately drawn to their infectious personalities. They are lively and funny and Lincoln is charmed. Instead of sending them a warning letter as dictated by company policy, Lincoln continues to read the emails and quickly becomes invested in their lives, unable to resist the bright spot they create in his otherwise tedious, mind-numbingly boring job. Things get even more complicated when he finds himself falling for Beth. Of course this is a huge invasion of privacy, but never underestimate the potential for trouble-making and bad decisions with hours of bored free time in an unfulfilling job.

Just scrolling through my sent box in my email I see subject lines of: "My Cubicle is Draining My Life Force", "Data Entry: Totally Worth All of That Student Loan Debt!", "Is Liking Three Songs in a Row on the Lite Rock Less Talk Station a Sign of Stockholm Syndrome?" so I definitely empathized with some of Lincoln's life and job frustrations. But my favorite part of this book by far (besides the swoonage of course) was Beth and Jennifer's relationship. I couldn't blame Lincoln for being so charmed---I was charmed! They were awesome and a perfect representation of the wonderfulness of BFFs. I loved them. Oh, and I realized if I had a mysteriously hot guy in my office that unbeknownst to me could read my emails, he'd have enough for a restraining order within the week. I admire Beth and Jennifer's restraint.

In closing: this book is so cute. It gave me a happy buzz the whole way through. Thank you Maggie for steering me to it! (And for always emailing me back! :D)

(less)

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Mar 28, 2013 Maria Ella rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: most-loved, romance, favorites, 2012-reading-challenge, chic-lit

"There are moments when you can't believe something wonderful is happening. And there are moments when your entire consciousness is filled with absolutely knowing that something wonderful is happening."

Told in a combination of epistolary episodes and third-person narrative, Attachments is about two closefriends and workmates chatting about anything under the sun, and an IT guy who oversees these correspondences. (Yes, if you are an IT guy, especially assigned to data and systems security, you ma...more

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Feb 17, 2013 Louize rated it 5 of 5 stars

Recommended to Louize by: AennA

Same thoughts from The Page Walker

WARNING: Cute guy flagged your emails.

Lincoln is 28 years of age, cute, single, plays Dungeon n’ Dragons, and lives with his mom; which worries his sister Eve. Lincoln’s new job, however, requires him to filter company emails at a local newspaper. He sits all night reading through employees’ correspondents and sends them warnings if they violate company email policy. Although the job earns him good money, Lincoln hates this job.

Ergo. Therefore. Thus …He technic

...more

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May 08, 2012 Sherri Huntley rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: first-reads

Attachments is a charming and clever novel that shares the email traffic between two friends, Jennifer and Beth. The emails themselves are witty and highlight the ups and downs of their lives. Beth’s despair about her long term boyfriend and Jennifer’s married life make for light-hearted and often funny reading. Bring in Lincoln, the IT guy whose job it is to read emails containing flagged words or questionable content but who gets caught up in the wit and charm of the emails between the two fri...more

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Apr 09, 2012 Alicia rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: romance, geek-love, brought-down-by-the-ending, ugh-first-person, best-first-person, okay-pov-changes, female-lead-i-love, male-lead-i-love, recommendations-for-you

This was one of the books I read while studying for the bar. I needed light, fluffy, and sweet and this book delivered that and much more. I loved it.

The story follows Lincoln, the IT guy of a newspaper who works overnights so he doesn't really have to deal with people and the job is fairly easy. Until the paper decides to institute a program that flags e-mails that aren't strictly about work or are inappropriate since e-mail was a fairly new office tool back then and management didn't want it a...more

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Jul 29, 2011 Audrey rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: contemporary

A really strong 3, almost a 4. Lincoln is a sweetheart. I was skeptical about his H-worthiness at the beginning of the book. We find out that he doesn't like going out to meet new people, he hasn't dated in three years, he's part of a group of friends who meet regularly every Saturday to play Dungeons & Dragons, AND he lives at home with his mother...and prefers it that way. I mean, are you kidding me?

But no, this story works in the end because we see Lincoln growing into adulthood and inde...more

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Mar 01, 2011 Greg Allan Holcomb rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: first-reads, books-i-own

As the only dude to win this book from Goodreads' First-Reads I feel a bit o' pressure.

I liked this book a lot. It's not Chick-lit. It's not Lad-lit. I'm putting this down as a Plane book. Go read it on a airplane.

Plot- Lincoln's the guy who monitors email at his work. He's supposed to report Beth and Jennifer, but he finds their emails entertaining. And he falls for Beth.

It's easy to see why he does. Over the course of the book we learn: Beth has a Sandman poster, She quotes Field of Dreams...more

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Mar 10, 2013 Lynai rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Tina, Monique, Cary, Tricia, and those who want to read about a cute IT guy and a movie reviewer

Recommended to Lynai by: Louize

Shelves: ebook

All the warm and fuzzy feels!!! Sigh.

I know that the love month has already passed but I can’t help but let all the love and fluffy-ness spill over to March. Attachments is such a lovely, lovely book. Had I known about this book earlier, I could have included this in my February reading list.

Jennifer and Beth both work in The Courier, a newspaper company, and they regularly exchange messages to each other using the company email, telling each other important and even random things about their se...more
All the warm and fuzzy feels!!! Sigh.

I know that the love month has already passed but I can’t help but let all the love and fluffy-ness spill over to March. Attachments is such a lovely, lovely book. Had I known about this book earlier, I could have included this in my February reading list.

Jennifer and Beth both work in The Courier, a newspaper company, and they regularly exchange messages to each other using the company email, telling each other important and even random things about their selves. Lincoln is hired to monitor the emails of the employees and while on the job, got to know about these two best friends. Jennifer and Beth both know that someone whom they call “the IT guy” reads the emails they send each other but that knowledge does not stop them from baring their souls and hearts. Lincoln should have both send them warnings for violating company policy but he just can’t seem to do so. The two friends are interesting and quirky and funny and Lincoln finds that he is actually looking forward to reading their messages everyday — even if he is not supposed to.

(view spoiler)[I don’t usually read all the reviews about a book I am about to read. I just browse through the ratings/stars and read a brief background about the story. That is why when I read the first few chapters of Attachments, I thought that this was not a love story. I thought that it would be a story about two people whose lives and friendship would intertwine with the events they would encounter in their work. I thought that Lincoln would only be just an outsider looking into the lives of Beth and Jennifer. I never thought that this book is actually mostly about him. This is such a sweet revelation, though, because I really really like Lincoln.

In fact, I think I finally have a fictional bookish crush. I don’t have a lot of bookish crushes (I can only think of Gale of The Hunger Games) but really, this time, I think I can finally claim Lincoln as my true bookish crush haha! Lincoln O’Neill is so easy to like — he is tall, smart, romantic, sweet (especially to his mom). Even his lame attempts to get himself a date and try to figure out what he wants in life are just so endearing. And most especially, he has all these geeky qualities that closely resembles him to Gian. (Hee, now you know why I’ve got a crush on Lincoln). *_____*

I am sorry for sounding like a pathetic high-schooler, but that is just the way I feel every time I remember Lincoln. I can’t help but gush and sigh about the story right after I was done with it. Haaayyyy. :D

Beth. I like her. I like her friendship with Jennifer. I like how she relates life events to movies and movie characters. She is headstrong and honest, and her dry humor is just the perfect antidote to Lincoln’s sentimentality. Beth’s character is actually revealed only by her emails but her it is enough to say that she is a perfect match for Lincoln. Only that both of them do not know it yet. And this brings me to my main point about this discourse:

“Is it possible to love someone you have not even met?”

I am not a believer of love at first sight. How can I possibly believe in love before that? This reminds me of a song that makes me feel mocked every time I listen to it: “I knew I loved you before I met you.” BUT. My romantic side can still tolerate all the fluffy-ness. For what kind of girl doesn’t want to feel all giddy and gushy sometimes? I am willing to overlook my practical and sensible self this time and just ride on with the feeling that yes, sometimes people do fall in love with someone they have not even met, if only in books. It is enough to say that Lincoln would easily confirm this.

“Do you believe in love at first sight?”

He made himself look at her face, at her wide-open eyes and earnest forehead. At her unbearably sweet mouth.

“I don’t know,” he said. “Do you believe in love before that?”

(hide spoiler)]

Did I say that this book just has all the feels? Sigh.

Also posted in It's A Wonderful Bookworld!(less)

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Apr 16, 2012 Jackie rated it 4 of 5 stars

I will leave the plot to the other reviewers, and go straight to I. LOVE. THIS. BOOK!!! Probably a 4.5 or maybe even a 4.75. I try to leave my 5 star ratings for books that actually change the way I think about something, or effect me in such a way that I think about the book for a long time after finishing it. Can you EVER say that about a book that is technically "chic-lit"??
I picked this up on a whim at the local library. The attraction was the fact that it was a light read, and it's February...more

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Jun 05, 2012 Jenne rated it 4 of 5 stars

Recommended to Jenne by: Linda Holmes

Shelves: fiftyfifty-me-2012

Y'know, this was kind of doofy, but charming. Much like the main character in it. He's a sort of IT guy who has to read employee emails that get flagged, and then he becomes fascinated by the conversations between two women that work there, and develops a crush on one of them.
I especially enjoyed that he has a D&D character who is a dwarf named 'Smov. And that one of the women's boyfriend is in a metal band named Sacajawea. RAD!
This is the kind of book where the ending makes or breaks it, an...more

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May 14, 2013 kari rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 5-star

Do you believe in love at first sight? What about before?
I'm paraphrasing from the book and you'll just have to read it to see what exactly that means.
I'm not sure where to start to say how much I love this book! I love the characters, the plot, the setting(around the time of the whole Y2K scare, our rehearsal for the Mayan 2012 apocalypse scare), the structure. There is not one single thing I would change. How many times do you get to end of a book and say that?
This is a quick read with two dif...more

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May 11, 2013 marg rated it 3 of 5 stars

This was my second encounter with Rowell, the first being her YA novel - a novel that, for all its flaws, moved me in unexpected ways. This one was about the same kind of thing, and in some ways was an interesting thing to experience, that there really isn't much that has to distinguish YA from adult when it comes to romance, even if the characters are more than a decade apart in age.
Rowell's writing, for me, fall in the Almost but Not Quite category. Her characters are funny, but they all sound...more This was my second encounter with Rowell, the first being her YA novel - a novel that, for all its flaws, moved me in unexpected ways. This one was about the same kind of thing, and in some ways was an interesting thing to experience, that there really isn't much that has to distinguish YA from adult when it comes to romance, even if the characters are more than a decade apart in age.
Rowell's writing, for me, fall in the Almost but Not Quite category. Her characters are funny, but they all sound the same. Her plots have an added layer of complexity, but still fall into shallow realms. In this work, she tells the story of Beth, a woman stuck in a nine year He's Just Not That Into You relationship who chats rather openly online with her coworker Jennifer, and Lincoln, the introverted IT guy who, because he has to for his job, ends up reading all of their IMs.
Lincoln falls for Beth's breezy wit and profound insight (though how he could differentiate her from Jennifer in this regard is beyond me) and in turn, Beth ends up crushing on the Cute but Shy guy she sees around the office, little knowing he is reading her emails about the subject.
The thing with this book is that it's stuck in a bit of a crossroads that I in particular struggled with, because I am equal parts incurable cynic and hopeless romantic. On the one hand, I am rooting for the couple, on the other, I am thinking of just how many ways this could and even should go wrong - I would like, for example, to see a book like this where the couple finally meets and ends up having nothing in common - or, actually, you know, Beth ISN'T beautiful in the end, she actually has two heads and horrible acne on both.
Also, Lincoln, whose bashfulness and freaking living with his mom at 28 was supposed to be somehow endearing, seemed to be borderline aspergers until he would suddenly morph into Heman.
This book was more than others like it have been - legit funny, often insightful, and as with her other, oddly touching. But I think I am not exactly the intended audience, for the cynic in my head would not quite shut up while I was reading, and thus the many holes in this fevered adult novel fantasy often eclipsed the romcom elements.(less)

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May 04, 2013 Erienne Jones rated it 5 of 5 stars

Review originally posted here: http://fictionfinders.blogspot.com/20...

Moving back home after acquiring an undergrad and multiple master's degrees, Lincoln finds that he still doesn't know who he is or what he wants. He lives with his mother and has a very limited social life. The most interesting thing about his current situation is that he works nights at The Courier as their internet security officer. As the "tech guy" for his company, Lincoln is also responsible for monitoring company wide e...more

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Apr 27, 2013 Karen.s rated it 4 of 5 stars

Ok, after reading Eleanor and Park and now Attachments, I have a new author to love: Rainbow Rowell. She writes witty, cute, hip romances about realistic characters. Her books are full of clever pop culture references, that could easily quickly date a book, but I don't think these will as they are for the most part cultural touchstones of a generation. It helps you identify with the characters.

This one is about late 20 somethings who all work at the Courier newspaper on the eve of 2000. What I...more

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Apr 21, 2013 Kumara rated it 4 of 5 stars

I always have had a thing for books written in the form of journals, letters and so on. I think it comes from when I first read Dracula and the fact I have always been a letter writer myself. The fact some of this novel is in the form of e-mail is the only reason I picked it up. I rarely read romance novels, if I read two a year it's a lot but I am glad that this is one I decided to read. The characters in the book are what did it for me, there was just something very normal about them, real peo...more

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Apr 08, 2013 Luba Lesychyn rated it 4 of 5 stars

Since most of this book was read while I was travelling back and forth on a streetcar between work and home, I kept praying for traffic delays so that I would not have to put the book away.

The story was gleefully engaging and the characters most accessible. As a film lover, it was a particularly fun read. The story was truly fresh and beautifully crafted and kept me on my toes.

I did find that despite the fact that I think the writer and I are likely close in age, some of the pop culture referenc...more

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Apr 02, 2013 Julie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Depuis que Milady a lancé sa nouvelle "gamme" de livres, j'avais très envie de me lancer et de tenter une lecture provenant de cette collection.

Le résumé de "Attachement" me plaisait bien bien que l'histoire soit très convenue d'avance et qu'avant même d'ouvrir le livre, on se doute de comment cela se terminera.

Néanmoins, j'avais envie de quelque chose de léger et c'est ce que j'ai trouvé. Ce bouquin a donc parfaitement répondu à mes attentes. J'ai apprécié, ça se lit vite et bien, l'histoire es...more

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Mar 28, 2013 Juli rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013, kindle-edition, new-in-2013

Again, wavering on rating (curses 5-star system for the 87th time), because I did love this book, and I love the characters, and I couldn't stop reading, because I was invested. I cared what happened. And it was a very sweet story. But here's the problem with inhaling everything an author has written, even if it's only two books: it's easy to start to notice patterns. I don't mind reading about characters who think they are unworthy of love (at least love from the person they're each in love wit...more Again, wavering on rating (curses 5-star system for the 87th time), because I did love this book, and I love the characters, and I couldn't stop reading, because I was invested. I cared what happened. And it was a very sweet story. But here's the problem with inhaling everything an author has written, even if it's only two books: it's easy to start to notice patterns. I don't mind reading about characters who think they are unworthy of love (at least love from the person they're each in love with) and don't like themselves very much, but that in reality of course, they are not nearly as hideous as they believe they are. And it was done DIFFERENTLY in Eleanor and Park from the way it was done in Attachments (not gonna spoil, suckas), but both main characters/love interests in both books feel that way, and it makes me almost wish I'd waited a bit to read this one.

Park was handsome and popular, but never thought he was good enough for crazy, unconventional Eleanor. Eleanor believed every bad thing anyone had ever said to her. She thought she was ugly and not feminine enough, and too tall and too big and too ungainly, too rude and too poor. (But one of my favorite parts of E&P is when he tries as hard as he can to think back and try to see her the way he first did, before he started seeing her beauty. But he can't. All he can see is how much he loves her now. <3) It doesn't help that Park's dad is always wishing Park was taller and tougher and more masculine that he is. And Eleanor's family is just... awful.

And back to the book I'm actually reviewing right now: I thought Lincoln looked completely different than when his appearance is finally described, because of his own bad opinion of himself. When he first sees Beth, he thinks she is strikingly beautiful and is charmingly wistful about it, but she is always disparaging her appearance and thinking she is too tall and solid. Which, fine, I get it, and it was done a lot better and more believable than I've seen in other books.

I just realized that all of these people are surely objectively not as ugly OR as stunning as they're subjectively described, but instead, somewhere between how they see themselves and how the people who love them see them.

Anyway, I don't know why I usually spend so much more time writing the parts of reviews that are negative, because I loved pretty much everything else about this book. The beginning was a little slow and I wasn't sure what to think about Lincoln OR Beth at first because of how they see themselves, but they grew on me, and they grew as characters the further I read. I laughed out loud a lot, and again, I'm definitely looking forward to Rowell's next book. So ignore all this mess I just tried to say and read her books for yourself. You don't have to take my word for it. ;)(less)

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Mar 27, 2013 Amanda rated it 4 of 5 stars

I want to be Rainbow Rowell's best friend. No, guys, I'm totally serious. I LOVED "Eleanor and Park", so I went back and read her first novel "Attachments". I was happy that I loved it so much. It's full of romantic and hilarity and ridiculousness and wonderfulness and creepiness in the best way possible.

I'm still wavering on giving this 5 stars. I'd go 4.5 if it was possible.

Beth and Jennifer reminded me a lot of my co-worker and her sister. They were super funny and their dialogue felt real an...more

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Mar 04, 2013 Loup Garou rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012

_Lincols neuer Job in der IT-Abteilung einer Tageszeitung hält für ihn einige Überraschungen bereit. Sein Job besteht hauptsächlich darin, den Email-Verkehr der Angestellten zu überwachen und auf arbeitsferne Inhalte zu überprüfen. Als Lincoln auf die offene und humorvolle Kommunikation zwischen zwei Freundinnen stößt, glaubt er seine Traumfrau gefunden zu haben. Doch wie sollte er ihr je sagen, dass er sie liebt?_

Liebesgeschichten in Form von Emails sind keine Neuerfindung, trotzdem war ich neu...more _Lincols neuer Job in der IT-Abteilung einer Tageszeitung hält für ihn einige Überraschungen bereit. Sein Job besteht hauptsächlich darin, den Email-Verkehr der Angestellten zu überwachen und auf arbeitsferne Inhalte zu überprüfen. Als Lincoln auf die offene und humorvolle Kommunikation zwischen zwei Freundinnen stößt, glaubt er seine Traumfrau gefunden zu haben. Doch wie sollte er ihr je sagen, dass er sie liebt?_

Liebesgeschichten in Form von Emails sind keine Neuerfindung, trotzdem war ich neugierig wie das Thema umgesetzt wurde.

Als Leser wechselt man ständig zwischen zwei Perspektiven: dem Mailwechsel zwischen Beth und Jennifer, und Lincolns täglichem Leben. Beide Erzählstränge sind miteinander verwoben, da Lincolns Job unter anderem darin besteht, die Mails seiner Kollegen zu lesen und auf arbeitsferne Inhalte mit Verwarnungen zu reagieren. Allerdings ist er von der offenen, humorvollen Kommunikation zwischen Beth und Jennifer so fasziniert, dass er die beiden nicht verwarnt. Je mehr Mails Lincoln liest, umso sympatischer werden sie ihm. Und um so schwieriger und verworrener wird die Situation. Denn bald gehen Lincolns Gefühle für Beth über Sympathie hinaus, und dass obwohl er sie noch nie gesehen hat. Und seine Gefühle für Beth sind der Grund, in seinem Leben endlich mal so einiges zu ändern.

Der Roman basiert fast ausschließlich auf Jennifer, Beth und Lincoln. Die zahlreichen Nebenfiguren nehmen fast keinen Einfluss auf die Entwicklung der Geschichte. Trotzdem sind sie mehr als nur platte Charaktere. Freunde und Familie der Hauptfiguren sind so authentisch und liebevoll dargestellt, dass man viele von ihnen leicht mit Personen im eigenen Umfeld identifizieren kann.
Beth und Jennifer wirken sehr sympatisch, ihr offener und humorvoller Umgang miteinander ebenso. Keine von beiden wirkt aufgesetzt, und allein durch ihre Emails kann man sich ein klares Bild von beiden machen.
Lincoln ist im Gegensatz zu den beiden Frauen weniger offen, gerade am Anfang wirkt er wie ein Durchschnittstyp. Er hat kein Glück bei Frauen und verschanzt sich vor der Welt und möglichen Kontakten, indem er Nachts arbeitet und noch bei seiner Mutter wohnt. Lincolns etwas hilfloser Charakter macht ihn schnell sympatisch, als Leser kann man sich leicht mit ihm identifizieren.

Die Geschichte schwächelt ein wenig am Anfang, nicht passiert so wirklich außer dem Mailwechsel zwischen Beth und Jennifer. Richtig spannend wirds erst im zweiten Drittel, die Story entwickelt sich schneller und die Beziehungen zwischen den drei Hauptfiguren wird komplizierter. Das Ende hat mich leider vollkommen kalt gelassen. Für meinen Geschmack war es unnötig dramatisch und kitschig, außerdem unnötig in die Länge gezogen.

Alles in allem ein schönes Buch für zwischendurch, goldrichtig für Happy-End-Fans und Freunde seichterer Liebesromane.(less)

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Feb 24, 2013 Jm Les-livres rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Lincoln, jeune homme de 27 ans, s’ennuie un peu dans sa vie. Il vit chez sa mère depuis la fin de ses études, il n’a pas eu de petite amie depuis sa première année de fac et il fait un travail qu’il n’aime pas. Enfin, ce n’est pas qu’il ne l’aime pas, c’est juste qu’il le trouve un peu immoral : il travaille au service sécurité Internet du journal local Courrier, où il est chargé de vérifier les e-mails des employés contenant des mots interdits (pornographie, sexe …). C’est comme ça qu’il découv...more Lincoln, jeune homme de 27 ans, s’ennuie un peu dans sa vie. Il vit chez sa mère depuis la fin de ses études, il n’a pas eu de petite amie depuis sa première année de fac et il fait un travail qu’il n’aime pas. Enfin, ce n’est pas qu’il ne l’aime pas, c’est juste qu’il le trouve un peu immoral : il travaille au service sécurité Internet du journal local Courrier, où il est chargé de vérifier les e-mails des employés contenant des mots interdits (pornographie, sexe …). C’est comme ça qu’il découvre les e-mails de Beth, critique de cinéma, et Jennifer, secrétaire de rédaction. Ces deux femmes légèrement névrosées, pleines d’humour, échangent sur les aléas de leurs vies. Beth aimerait que son copain guitariste la demande en mariage et Jennifer se croit, comme à chaque période prémenstruelle, enceinte de son mari (elle sent une présence dans son ventre).

Dès le premier chapitre, le ton est donné. L’auteur nous offre une brochette de personnages amusants mais surtout criants de vérité. Les aléas de la vie de Beth et Jennifer pourraient tout à fait nous arriver et, tout comme Lincoln, on se sent très vite attiré par ce qui se passe dans leur vie. On se surprend à dire « j’aurais fait pareil » ou à vouloir leur donner des conseils comme si elles étaient nos amies. Et si c’était du voyeurisme 2.0 ?

Cependant, ce livre ne se contente pas de nous offrir des échanges marrants entre deux amies. Un chapitre sur deux, nous découvrons Lincoln, sa vie, ses amis, ses soirées Donjons & Dragons, sa mère et ses petits plats. Durant tout le récit, on en apprend un peu plus sur lui, sur les éléments antérieurs qui l’ont rendu si renfermé. Et au fur et à mesure, nous suivons son évolution ; nous voyons de quelles façons ce qui arrive aux deux amies joue sur sa vie, l’influence et lui apporte la maturité qui lui manquait. Car au fil des échanges, Lincoln tombe peu à peu sous le charme de Beth et, dans un univers parallèle, espère avoir sa chance avec elle. Lors de ses déplacements dans les locaux, il la cherche, il espère la croiser. Peu à peu, le jeune homme timide s’ouvre aux autres, sort avec des collègues et reprend sa vie en main. Lincoln est clairement le héros de cette histoire.

Cette romance contemporaine ne ressemble pas à celles que l’on a déjà pu lire : la rencontre n’arrive pas au début du livre, les personnages ne se tombent pas dessus par hasard et ne tombent pas amoureux au premier regard. On ne suit que Lincoln dans sa vie de tous les jours, et l’amour naît d’une manière plus conventionnelle : on se repère de loin, on aime le physique de l’autre et on tente d’en apprendre le plus possible sur cette personne. C’est très rafraîchissant et nouveau pour ce genre-là. On laisse les personnages arriver à point dans leur vie pour qu’enfin le miracle (de l’amour) opère. Milady a su clairement se démarquer des autres éditeurs avec cette histoire, presque banale, mais surtout que l’on pourrait voir à un coin de rue, au bureau, n’importe où.(less)

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Feb 17, 2013 Theo Fenraven rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: humor

Blurb: "Hi, I'm the guy who reads your e-mail, and also, I love you . . . "

Beth Fremont and Jennifer Scribner-Snyder know that somebody is monitoring their work e-mail. (Everybody in the newsroom knows. It's company policy.) But they can't quite bring themselves to take it seriously. They go on sending each other endless and endlessly hilarious e-mails, discussing every aspect of their personal lives.

Meanwhile, Lincoln O'Neill can't believe this is his job now- reading other people's e-mail. Whe...more

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Jan 08, 2013 Ceridwen rated it 4 of 5 stars

Recommended to Ceridwen by: Catie

Shelves: america-and-environs, for-teh-ladies, grrrrl-power

The epistolary novel has been dead on arrival for a long time, maybe since even back in the day, but then my memory of anything by Samuel Richardson, force-read in intro classes in college, is hazy as hell. Even Austen, 200 years ago, rewrote "First Impressions", an epistolary novel, into what would become Pride and Prejudice, and bless her heart for that. (Especially because I just recently read Austen's Lady Susan, which was never re-written, and I could feel how the novel suffered from its ep...more The epistolary novel has been dead on arrival for a long time, maybe since even back in the day, but then my memory of anything by Samuel Richardson, force-read in intro classes in college, is hazy as hell. Even Austen, 200 years ago, rewrote "First Impressions", an epistolary novel, into what would become Pride and Prejudice, and bless her heart for that. (Especially because I just recently read Austen's Lady Susan, which was never re-written, and I could feel how the novel suffered from its epistolary format.) As a novel style, letter-writing hung on in Gothic longer, though I couldn't exactly say why. Frankenstein, Dracula, and if my internet search is to be believed, books like House of Leaves and The Historian are all epistolary, and slightly cheesy for it. It's a weird way to have characters interact, maybe not a hundred years ago, but certainly now, and even a hundred years ago, letter-writing stories stripped out the narrator, who is the ace up the sleeve of any writer. Maybe. Don't hold me to that statement.

Which is why it is fairly astonishing to find an epistolary novel written in this century (hell, even the last century) which works. Beth and Jennifer are both employees at a Midwestern newspaper, and friends; Lincoln is the man tasked with reading the emails flagged by whatever metric flags inter-office correspondence. In rom-com style, Lincoln reads the emails between these women, and becomes more and more smitten with the unmarried-but-attached Beth, while trying to cope with his life as it is: living with mom, hanging with his D&D crowd, being paid to be a voyeur. This is set right at the millennium shift, because even a decade later (now), such a scenario is unlikely. We all know what exact crap the work overlords are flagging or blocking, and get around such things using smartphones or off-work email. But I knew a sys-admin back in the day who had to read through a whole horrible romance with one of the company employees and a - for lack of a better phrase here - corporate spy from another company who was obviously using her for her corporate knowledge. My friend was so horrified and grossed out by reading this correspondence, which was both intimate and, knowing what he did about the other dude, totally Browning-esque in its damaged narrators. Which is a weird thing to say about real life, but art and life, etc.

Anyway, point being, I pretty much loved the ways Beth and Jennifer interacted in their little illicit emails. They are snappy are funny, maybe even snappier and funnier than is likely, but then I know and correspond with a lot of funny folk, so it really isn't a stretch except for in narrative unity stylins, which is more than ok for me in a novel. Lincoln's sections are not in epistolary form, which is good, and I generally appreciated the ways the other characters were, um, characterized. Like you do. He's got this absolutely foul-mouthed friend who ends up being a rigid traditionalist in some ways, and I totally know that guy. I know the attachment parenting friend who plays D&D with the guys. I know a lot of these people. It's possible I even am some of these people, but, like, less quick to the quip. That I feel that way at all is fantastic, given that I usually want to strangle rom-com people until their tongues loll out.

Which is probably the thing: this sort of careful, almost deliberately casual, snappy Gen-X rom-com is only going to work for certain types of folk. I mean, duh, any book at all out there is going to have its readership and not another - that's presumably why we're out here at all chattering about the books we read, trying to marry a book with its best audience - but I felt that decidedly here. While I know that this term is trouble, and I don't want to get into a big fight about it, I feel like this is chick-lit for nerds, and as a nerd who has read the occasional chick-lit, hoorah. I'm too lazy to check if Bridget Jones's Diary counts as a epistolary novel - diary-form being somewhat more solipsistic, blahity blah - but Attachments hit the same part of my brain that enjoyed that, in that it's girly and fluffy while being smart and lightly allusive, and I appreciate the heck out of that.

I'm not going to say it's perfect - the crisis and denouement are rushed and somewhat unbelievable, not crediting the real ethical problems of voyeuristic email-reading like maybe you should - but whatever. I'm still back on jazzed as hell that a novel that falls into the dreaded category of women's fiction doesn't fail the Bechdel test, and doesn't fail it hard. Love is great and all, but I'm so happy to find female friends who talk in the way female friends do about all everything and whatever. If you're in the likely readership for this book, you know what I mean.

Cross-posted on Readerling (less)

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Nov 03, 2012 Danielle rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: chick-lit, danielle-recommends, fiction

Fun, but not fluff. For one thing, Rowell can actually write. The dialogue was wholly believable (in addition to being witty and intelligent) and unlike a lot of chick-lit, the characters didn't all sound exactly the same.
The real kicker, of course, was the love story. Will they or won't they? How's it all going to work out? It was fun and sweet and I genuinely cared about the hero and heroine and their happiness. But I was especially impressed by the way the story was told (narrative from the...more

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Oct 26, 2012 Maricar rated it 4 of 5 stars

I have been looking for this book for quite a long time since I didn't think local bookstores carry it. Good thing I decided to call several ones and it was meant that I'd get a copy!

I admit that I got interested with the book after all the excerpts and quotes from the posts that I read from Tumblr. All the more that I see them, all the more that I got interested on what happened between Beth and Jennifer and if Lincoln ever got to be in the picture significantly.

Finished this in one sitting. I...more

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Sep 18, 2012 K rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: library, pb-wishlist

I love when I open a book and it lets me know right away that we’re going to get along. I’m a sucker for banter.

Lincoln, aka IT Guy, works nights at the Courier. He applied without realizing what the job entailed, that he would be the voyeur policing employees’ email. It’s 1999 and Y2K is looming but the Courier is a little outdated. They’ve got a program that flags inappropriate emails and Lincoln is the human element that sends out the warnings. It’s boring, monotonous, and a kind of skeevy.

B...more

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Aug 18, 2012 Margaret H. rated it 5 of 5 stars

(Originally posted here: http://thepierglass.tumblr.com/post/2...)

So, I just finished a book that I loved. LOVED. Attachments by Rainbow Rowell. If you like contemporary, true-to-life-but-also-happy, funny-insightful-moving books* then just GO BUY IT NOW PLEASE.**

I read it in two days. I do not know how I could have read it more slowly. From the first sentence, I cared about the characters so much. Soon, I cared about them so much it hurt a little, but only in the best way. And when things worke...more (Originally posted here: http://thepierglass.tumblr.com/post/2...)

So, I just finished a book that I loved. LOVED. Attachments by Rainbow Rowell. If you like contemporary, true-to-life-but-also-happy, funny-insightful-moving books* then just GO BUY IT NOW PLEASE.**

I read it in two days. I do not know how I could have read it more slowly. From the first sentence, I cared about the characters so much. Soon, I cared about them so much it hurt a little, but only in the best way. And when things worked out for them (and I think you’ll know, when you read it, that this is the kind of book where they do***), at the end, it made me cry. Part from the caring-so-much-it-hurt. But partly for the same reason “Cigarettes and Coffee” does: because the love Rowell’s captured hits this dangerous sweet spot between perfect and plausible. It seems like something I could really have, in life: someone**** who’d love me the way Otis loves his lady, the way Lincoln loves Beth— completely and accurately. And it’s something I want very badly TO have, it’s a way I’d liked to be loved. And I am terrified (like every self-aware single person) that I won’t be one of the lucky ones who gets it.

As a pretty happy person, I have mastered the skill of really appreciating what I’ve got. I am great at counting my blessings. But the skill I’m still learning is knowing the exact shape of something I want without knowing if I’ll ever get to have it. And these two pieces of art— this book, this song— they are two things that jolt me, sometimes into sadness, because they show me the exact shape of how I want to be loved. And I have to hold that in my heart and just— hope. Knowing it means I might be hurt or disappointed. Knowing that if it doesn’t show up, it will be an exactly shaped lack I end up holding in my heart instead.

There isn’t a way, really, this gets easier. There is just the waiting until you know the answer. So just: this isn’t a post soliciting advice, or searching for reassurance. It’s just an honest tribute to a book and song that affect me deeply, that I think are wonderful. If you want to help, just wish me luck. I bet most of you know the feeling.

*The best I can manage right now, to describe the tone, is it’s like two clicks less dark than HIGH FIDELITY but no less honest.

** Or check it out from Your Friendly Neighborhood Library.

*** But without cheating, or cutting corners, or fuzzing the numbers. The emotional math is sound and true. It just adds up to good things in the end. I think that’s something not enough authors try.

**** Other than my best friends. (less)

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Jul 17, 2012 Lydia Laceby rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 5-star-must-read

Originally reviewed at Novel Escapes

Attachments is absolutely delightful! I immediately warmed to this quirky novel full of loveable characters, unusual circumstances and nostalgic references. Heart warming, romantic and utterly grin-invoking, there’s nothing not to love about Attachments.

This novel was funny, clever, cute and a joy to read. The characters of the two women came across so well from their emails and Lincoln was such a fabulous character to root for. Pining away for his high schoo...more Originally reviewed at Novel Escapes

Attachments is absolutely delightful! I immediately warmed to this quirky novel full of loveable characters, unusual circumstances and nostalgic references. Heart warming, romantic and utterly grin-invoking, there’s nothing not to love about Attachments.

This novel was funny, clever, cute and a joy to read. The characters of the two women came across so well from their emails and Lincoln was such a fabulous character to root for. Pining away for his high school sweetheart for the last nine years, I couldn’t help wanting to kick him into gear, but Lincoln grew to realize change was necessary on his own so I didn’t have to invent a way to teleport back a dozen years to an imagined time and place to kick his ass. His gradual transition was believable and immensely enjoyable to read.

I found Attachments really nostalgic. In 1999, I was in my mid-twenties, close to the age of the characters and I immediately related to the time period and all the pop culture and nostalgic references as well as the anti-climactic Y2K New Year’s Eve. I also related to the two women and their lives in emails because I too lived my life in emails during this time. Long drawn out conversations with girlfriends took place and I cringe to think of what the ‘email filters’ spewed out of my inbox. It wasn’t a stretch at all for me to believe you could get to know someone via their emails, especially back in the day of long drawn out ‘novels’ like those I used to write my girlfriends.

I actually had to google a Star Wars reference because I didn’t believe that the follow up movie, or prequels came out in 1999. Yes, I have no fondness for Star Wars, have not even seen the three recent installments, but of course I knew the reference and was shocked to find all copy editing correct and bamboozled by how quickly time has passed. I was also surprised by how many of the geekish references in this novel I knew and giggled at and appreciated. I never would have thought I would be rooting for a Dungeons and Dragons playing, Star Wars loving creature. But I was. But then again, I love The Big Bang Theory, so maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised.

Both men and women will enjoy this lighthearted romantic tale. I really want this to be a movie, but I don’t think it would come across well especially with almost all the interaction between the two women taking place via email. Attachments will appeal to the romantic geek in everyone as well as everyone who came of age during the invention of the internet. I loved every word and will definitely be reading more from Rainbow Rowell.(less)

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Jul 13, 2012 Jackie rated it 1 of 5 stars

Plucked this book off the Reader's Choice rack at the local library. Started out with a lot of promise. Quickly fizzled to disappointing. My issues:

1. The language. I don't care what the writers try to foist off on the readers: foul language is never becoming. And I don't enjoy reading way-too-frequent references to personal sexual self-gratification. Seriously?

2. The immature 28 year olds who work in the same office, the same shift and e-mail each other rather than have face-to-face conversatio...more

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topics	posts	views	last activity
A Light Funny Book :)	3	30	Feb 08, 2013 09:54am
The Last Line	6	34	Aug 15, 2012 06:46pm

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