Title:
Author:
My Rating: 2/5
Part of a series? Not at the time of writing this.
Genre(s): Contemporary, Romance, Chick lit, New York.
Description/Blurb:
Impressionable and idealistic, Esme Garland is a young British woman who finds herself studying art history in New York. She loves her apartment and is passionate about the city and her boyfriend; her future couldn’t look brighter. Until she finds out that she’s pregnant.
Esme’s boyfriend, Mitchell van Leuven, is old-money rich, handsome, successful, and irretrievably damaged. When he dumps Esme—just before she tries to tell him about the baby—she resolves to manage alone. She will keep the child and her scholarship, while finding a part-time job to make ends meet. But that is easier said than done, especially on a student visa.
The Owl is a shabby, second-hand bookstore on the Upper West Side, an all-day, all-night haven for a colorful crew of characters: handsome and taciturn guitar player Luke; Chester, who hyperventilates at the mention of Lolita; George, the owner, who lives on protein shakes and idealism; and a motley company of the timeless, the tactless, and the homeless. The Owl becomes a nexus of good in a difficult world for Esme—but will it be enough to sustain her? Even when Mitchell, repentant and charming, comes back on the scene?
My review:
Warning this review may be a bit harsh.
This book made me feel seriously guilty for reading books on my ipad, the second hand bookshop in this story is built up so well, you can imagine the atmosphere and how the small number of staff care for and interact with each other really pulls on the heartstrings when you think of all the business they must have lost through eBooks and websites like Amazon.
Reading this left me quite frustrated at times, I lost count of the number of times I wanted to shout at Esme (the main character) or slap some sense into her. She makes bad decision after bad decision in her relationships; she could have got rid of the boyfriend to save herself all the games. The relationship with Mitchell didn't really make much sense anyway. The author puts Esme across as this intelligent women who’s independent enough to cross the Atlantic to further her education and then decide she’s capable of raising a baby on her own, yet she becomes completely dependent on the love/approval of a man who to be quite frank is a complete arse (not to mention not particularly well developed as a character). I know this is a trait that is fairly common amongst chick-lit romances but at least the author could give us a consistent character.
Another slight niggle I had with the book were the frequent literary and art references, some of them quite obscure. I don’t usually mind the odd reference, they’re one of the reasons why I found jasper fforde’s ‘Thursday Next’ books so enjoyable, however there is a point where they get too much. They didn't really add too much to the plot other than to verify Esme’s knowledge of Art History so the reader is able to just over look them and move on but if you are the curious type and not a literature or art buff you may find yourself having a sneaky Google every now and then.
The author appears to make the occasional attempt at social commentary in the book through the bookstore owner’s habit of paying a couple of homeless people to do odd jobs such as clean the windows and then through Esme’s thoughts on these people and the life they live (don’t want to give out too many spoilers).
While I do have to say that this book wasn't 100% to my own personal taste, I have to give this book 2/5 instead of say 1/5 is because I do believe that some people, particularly fans of chick-lit, might enjoy it. I didn't find any structural problems such as odd spelling or grammar which would make the book difficult to read, all my nit-picking was with the characters and story itself so I can see somebody picking this book for a slower paced holiday read.
