Unlikely Story

A cute chick-lit story that follows all the tropes, but was still original enough to keep me listening.

This one follows Nora (or Eleanora, which is important later), a therapist who, when she first started to practice, allowed her British friend to talk her into writing an advice column in a British paper called “Ask Eleanora.” For the previous 8 years, her copy editor, J, corresponded with her weekly with comments and edits. Eventually, Nora realizes (when J tells her his relationship recently ended) that she has feelings for him–which is odd, since she’s never met him. She doesn’t even know what he looks like. (You can feel the setup here, and it is a little contrived, but I can suspend my disbelief to go with it.)

Meanwhile, Nora lives in a community in New York consisting mostly of elderly strong characters. But the woman who used to live just below her passed away, and her grandson moved in. He’s British, he’s cantankerous, and he’s hot. Of course he (Eli) and Nora start off on the wrong foot, even though there’s also instant attraction. Eli, it turns out, is a writer, of some non-specific genre that never comes up in conversation, until he and Nora finally sleep together. (And again: does it bother no one that it’s completely normal and expected in our culture that as soon as you’re ready to kiss someone, you’re automatically expected to also have sex with him?! Even if you don’t believe in waiting for marriage, doesn’t anyone find this a *little* concerning? Don’t we think this cultural expectation *might* pressure people to hop into bed just because it’s the thing to do, and not because they necessarily really even want to?)

But I digress. Obviously in the context of this book, they did want to (though it goes into way too much detail and I had to skip both those chapters.) I will say that the slow burn leading up to sex was well done. I also appreciate the fact that the conflict at the end was neither a big misunderstanding, nor a sudden emotional freak-out from the female lead, suddenly drowning in her insecurities. I’ve seen that done one too many times. And the ending was sweet, and uplifting, as books like this are meant to be.

My rating: ***1/2

Language: present but not overwhelming

Violence: none

Sexual content: yes, and too much of it. 

Political content: present but minor

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