Marilyn's allocated reading for her book Club this week is 'Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine' by Gail Honeyman, not something she would normally pick up but she girded her loins and got stuck in. It's fair to say she became enthralled and said I would like it too. I had come across it months ago just after I had finished 'A Man Called Ove'. Having enjoyed that a lot, I asked Google to suggest any other books like it and 'Eleanor Oliphant ...' was one on the list. However, the description of the storyline didn't appeal to me so I moved on to something else.
In fact, I've been wading through the Jeeves books by PG Wodehouse. They're awful and I was just starting to tear my hair out when Marilyn made her suggestion. The cover notes didn't appeal to me: a single female, struggling with relationships meets an obvious misfit, and so on. However, I thought I should give it a go and, within a few pages, I was hooked. Eleanor is obviously socially inept, perhaps on the autism spectrum, and naive. She is in love with a member of a band whom she has never met. Of course, by chance she meets an unlikely soulmate and the book has a happy ending. It is beautifully written and gripping.
I might start to take more notice of Marilyn's recommendations in future. I'm still blinkered into thinking that women read different books to men but I only have to look at Marilyn's taste to know that it's rubbish. She reads the same books as I do: mostly UK crime novels, and she reads them faster and in more depth.
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