Narrated by: Rosie Jones
Publisher: Simon Schuster Audio UK
Genre: Rom-Com
Format: Audiobook
Release Date: January 1st, 2016
Rating: 1/5 Stars
This is going to be a bit of a ranty review, I’m afraid. And it might possibly be one of my harshest reviews to date, but if this is a book you’ve been eying up, I’d actually recommend giving this a miss. If it wasn’t for the fact it was a Reading Challenge book and on Audible, I probably would have DNF’d. On the one hand, the narrator was actually pretty decent, but a lot of the text itself I found to be humourless, cruel, and not really a pleasant reading experience.
Let’s start with Emma, the main character. Emma makes a series of absolutely ridiculous decisions, then spends the whole novel moaning about it and how it’s all the fault of everyone else. She constantly and consistently has specific views about anyone who dares to have a sex life, especially if they are plus-size. It really grated on me the way she spoke about Martha, as if it was absolutely pathetic that men would want to sleep with her, and her whole character was treated as a joke because of her weight. Emma’s ex-boyfriend – and the father of her child – borrows money from her constantly for his ‘business ideas’, steals all of her savings when she’s pregnant and they break up, yet this is all treated as absolutely fine because by the end his business is completely, randomly successful.
Men get a lot of passes in this book, actually, whereas the women are portrayed as caricatures and stereotypes. Oh, and right until her first scan, Emma is totally committed to having an abortion, but once she “sees the baby” she totally changes her mind. It felt really jarring – there was no actual hesitation before, and it smacked of a kind of pro-life message. Not that she had to have the abortion but this could have been handled so, so much better rather than flipping from one extreme to the other. It was a complete flip from absolutely completely definitely to oh now I’ve seen the scan I want to keep it.
I’m going to talk about Martha a bit more. Martha is a chaperone, which means she accompanies a young child to set when filming, makes sure they’re looked after, they get to set on time, that they’re not overworked. Martha’s insistence on doing things right is treated as an absolute joke, and I honestly couldn’t tell if we’re meant to feel sorry for Emma when Martha criticises her particular…style of chaperoning. Emma is doing this to help her sister-in-law and nephew, after she’s quit her previous job. There are times when Martha has to take over to look after the nephew, because Emma is busy chatting on her phone and obsessing over her ex, Emma moans because Martha hides her snacks, and because Martha dares – dares – to enforce how long children are supposed to be on set for. Basically, Emma is appallingly bad at the job she’s hired for, Martha tries to correct the issues and is ignored, and treated as an overall joke for trying to make sure the kids are properly looked after. Martha is, quite literally, doing everything right, and when Emma gets hold of something she can use against Martha, one of the first things she does is basically allow the director to continue shooting scenes after the children are supposed to be off set. Well done, Emma.
Honestly, this book was painful at times. And ridiculous, not in a good way, and I totally didn’t appreciate that despite going to north Wales, the only Welsh character Emma actually meets is a woman living in London who is totally paranoid about the “big city”, constantly oversteps boundaries, and plays into stereotypes that were very cringy.
So yeah, I wouldn’t recommend this one. If you’re looking for a fun, uplifting Chick Lit book, How Not to Fall in Love, Actually really isn’t it.
Netflix Movies & TV Shows
Prompt: Enola Holmes – Independent Woman
Progress: 5/24 Completed
Unwrapping Words 