Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman – book review
THE BLURB
Eleanor Oliphant has learned how to survive – but not how to live
Eleanor Oliphant leads a simple life. She wears the same clothes to work every day, eats the same meal deal for lunch every day and buys the same two bottles of vodka to drink every weekend.
Eleanor Oliphant is happy. Nothing is missing from her carefully timetabled life. Except, sometimes, everything.
One simple act of kindness is about to shatter the walls Eleanor has built around herself. Now she must learn how to navigate the world that everyone else seems to take for granted – while searching for the courage to face the dark corners she’s avoided all her life.
Change can be good. Change can be bad. But surely any change is better than… fine?
MY THOUGHTS
I am so late to the game on this one as pretty much everyone I know has already read this book and has been raving about for about a year now. I’m always hesitant to pick up a book when it’s become so popular as very often, they don’t quite live up to the hype. I needn’t have worried though.
Eleanor Oliphant isn’t like most people. She has a different way of seeing and processing the world and is perfectly fine in the existence that she has built for herself thank you very much. And that’s exactly what it is, existing not living. Until that is, something happens that starts a series of events which forces her to interact with the world and makes her realise that perhaps something is missing after all.
Eleanor Oliphant made me laugh, it made me cry and it gave me hope. Now don’t get me wrong, if you look too closely at the plot then it’s riddled with holes but that didn’t stop me enjoying every single page. More importantly though, I found it made me pause and consider how I’ve ever treated the Eleanor Oliphant’s that I’ve come into contact in my life. Although slow to start, it’s worth sticking with as the second half of the book more than makes up for the initial pace. Especially as this pace I think us purposefully there to reflect the monotony and repetition of Eleanor’s life.
If – like me – you still haven’t got around to this one. I really recommend that you do. Without a doubt it lives up to its hype and is worth a read. Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine is available on Amazon (affiliate link).
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