Hurting Distance (Sophie Hannah)***

Sophie Hannah is probably best-known as a poet, and this is easy to believe from her prose. Everything she writes is beautiful, even when she is writing about some pretty horrific subjects, as very often happens in her thrillers. I don’t like violence as a rule. I’d certainly stay well away if Hurting Distance was ever made into a television serial because there is a lot of violence in the book that I really don’t want to see happening. Hannah’s writing doesn’t exactly make it any nicer or more comfortable to imagine, but there was something about it that made it very easy for me to keep reading, and to accept all the horrible things that are happening without freaking out over them.

The problem with Hurting Distance is that the crime Hannah writes about could never happen. Even assuming the plan was put into place, and a start was made on finding all the people they needed for the crime to have its full effect, it is impossible that it would have been able to continue for so many years without detection. There is too much that could have gone wrong. That said, it is definitely something of a relief to know something so terrible can’t happen.

The ‘good’ characters are very strong and very interesting, but, while they’re certainly not on the criminals’ level, they do get away with things they shouldn’t. Quite serious things, too. The ‘victim’ Naomi, does something absolutely awful that really ought to have had repercussions. The fact that her story does actually lead to the uncovering of a crime that was even worse than hers doesn’t change what she did. And that’s not the worst thing she does.

As for policewoman Charlie Zailer, she surely ought to arrest herself for the way she treats the criminals. Yes, they did terrible things, but while it is easy to sympathise with the emotions that prompt Charlie’s behaviour towards them, it doesn’t make it right, and, as a member of the police force, she should know better. But the other policeman, Simon Waterhouse, who had a starring role in Hannah’s wonderful first thriller, Little Face, is fascinating. Very weird, but a nice person. Probably the only nice person in Hurting Distance.

But somehow, none of these problems matter when you’re reading. The fact that I didn’t like most of the characters wasn’t important. The important thing was the plot, and finding out what was going to happen next. I always knew in the back of my mind that it couldn’t happen, but that didn’t make the story any less compelling. Hannah’s writing is so vivid, it’s easy to get caught up in it, and to believe it not only could happen, but it is happening as you’re reading it. Perhaps it’s set in a kind of parallel universe.

One good thing about the book’s not being completely grounded in reality is that it becomes even less predictable. Even though I figured out one major twist at what was probably the earliest point possible to do so, I never knew what was going to happen at any other time. And I always wanted to know what was going to happen because it’s a really exciting story. In theory, I have so many strong objections to the events in the story, but I found I was overcoming then almost without thinking about it because I just had to know where Hannah was going to take her characters next.

Being Elizabeth Bennet (Emma Campbell Webster)**

Being Elizabeth Bennet gives Jane Austen fans the chance to do the thing they’ve always wanted to do – be one of her heroines – but, like Alexandra Potter’s Me and Mr Darcy, it turns out to be disappointing. Maybe the truth is that Jane Austen is unique, and no-one else can write her novels for her. But six completed novels (if you include Persuasion, which could have done with another rewrite but did tell the full story) from Jane Austen is probably worth six hundred novels from anybody else, so perhaps asking for more than that is just too greedy.

Being Elizabeth Bennet is in the style of a conventional adventure game book. You read a page; get diverted to another page; make choices that determine your success as a young Regency woman in search of a husband. Your choices, as well as the situations that befall you, are rewarded by increases and decreases in your intelligence and fortune points. You are also required to make lists of your Good and Bad Connections, and your Accomplishments and Failings. It’s all quite complicated, but ultimately necessary if you want to know what Campbell-Webster thinks you deserve.

The book mostly sticks with Pride and Prejudice, but there are opportunities for a number of diversions. If you’re lucky, you can become romantically entangled with and, in most cases, receive proposals of marriage, not only from Mr Collins and Mr Darcy, but also Willoughby (Sense and Sensibility), Mr Wickham and Colonel Fitzwilliam (Pride and Prejudice), Henry Crawford (Mansfield Park), Mr Knightley and Robert Martin (Emma), Henry Tilney (Northanger Abbey), Captain Wentworth, ‘Mr Bennet’ (Jane Austen’s Mr Elliott) and Captain Benwick (Persuasion) and Tom Lefroy (a real-life acquaintance of Jane Austen’s). In short, it’s fair to say that Campbell-Webster’s Elizabeth Bennet gets around a bit.

Of course, in order to consider marrying such vastly different gentlemen, it is necessary for Elizabeth to fall at least a little bit in love, which in turn necessitates a number of personality changes. Such strange behaviour can only suggest schizophrenia, or a disturbing tendency to transform herself into the person her companion wants her to be – neither of which seem to affect the real Elizabeth Bennet. Indeed, the very idea that Elizabeth would, as this book suggests, be searching for a husband in the first place rather suggests that Campbell-Webster does not know the character quite as well as she ought to.

Perhaps these difficulties could be overlooked if they were the only problems: after all, this book is just a bit of fun. Or is it? Part of the fun for Campbell-Webster seems to be setting herself up as a kind of conscience figure for Elizabeth, not only telling you what points you have won and lost, but also taunting her unkindly, telling her she’s stupid and unattractive. While Jane Austen is certainly not above poking fun at her characters occasionally, she generally does so with great affection. Austen does go into some detail about Elizabeth’s thoughts, but she still leaves room for the reader’s imagination to see her characters as they wish to. Campbell-Webster seems to despise Elizabeth, and to have more sympathy for the sensibilities of Marianne Dashwood, and it is very difficult to see Elizabeth in any way other than the way Campbell-Webster wants us to see her.

Also, some of the diversions are very easy to avoid if you know the story. The book might have been a bit more fun if Elizabeth had met some of her other men without going to places she doesn’t in Pride and Prejudice. For example, perhaps Mr Darcy could have brought Mr Knightley with him to see Lady Catherine instead of Colonel Fitzwilliam, and then perhaps Captain Wentworth could have been staying in Derbyshire. When Elizabeth is offered a trip to Bath, it is clear to the Austen fan that she will meet Henry Tilney there (which, okay, is a very good reason for going). But why not send Elizabeth to Meryton, give her a choice of going left or right, with one of the options leading her to Wickham, and one to Henry? Something like that. We don’t need to see the diversions coming from miles away.

To be fair to Campbell-Webster, the book was probably more difficult to put together than an original story, and probably not many authors could have done a better job; possibly the only author who could have done so is Jane Austen. And, considering that so many Austen fans will read anything in order to spend a little more time with Austen’s marvellous characters, you can’t really blame Campbell-Webster for wanting to write the book, for either financial or creative reasons. But that still doesn’t mean it’s any good.

Getting Rid of Matthew (Jane Fallon)***

It’s the old love triangle situation. Helen is sleeping with Matthew who is married to Sophie. Helen begs Matthew to leave Sophie, but he won’t. But then he does leave her, and Helen realises that, actually, she’d have preferred it if Matthew had stayed where he was.

It’s not the greatest book in the world, but it’s very funny. Probably a laugh on every page, although there are certainly jokes that don’t quite work, such as the confusion caused by Sophie’s nickname for her stepson – a nickname that completely disappears from use once the case of mistaken identity is resolved. But most of the humour is great. Helen is not as stupid as most heroines - the ridiculous situations she finds herself in are not so much down to stupidity as to bad luck and a lamentable but nevertheless perfectly natural curiosity about the Other Woman. But then, most people would seem intelligent next to Matthew.

Jane Fallon doesn’t give many of her characters a great deal of depth, but this is probably because Helen and Matthew are shallow and selfish people. Both of them behave incredibly badly, and it doesn’t help that the wronged Sophie is far nicer than either of them, with considerably more depth and kindness than both of them put together.

Matthew is irritating, clingy, and a total baby who cries too much - and I usually think it’s cute when guys cry. His inability to stay faithful to Sophie must also be mentioned, although, it has to be said, he does seem to stay faithful to Helen once he’s moved in with her. But what he really needs is a mother, not a wife or girlfriend.

Helen behaves in a way that probably amounts to stalking Sophie (this happens after Matthew has left her), and spends the whole of their resulting friendship telling lies. Helen keeps a list of people she hates which is scarily long, and some of her reasons for disliking people are irrational. But it’s difficult not to feel sympathy for Helen when her best friend Rachel is too busy having sex to make time for her. No wonder Helen gets in such a mess when the only person being friendly to her (apart from the embarrassingly affectionate ‘Helen from Accounts’) is Sophie.

So, in making these very ordinary and rather shallow people so amusing and even, eventually, likeable, Fallon’s novel is really quite clever. Helen and Matthew are far from perfect, and Fallon makes this very clear, but you do end up liking them for it - Helen because she does at least seem prepared to learn from all her mistakes; Matthew because he probably would learn from them if only he had the maturity. (Matthew seems to be the standard name for immature men in chick lit: see also The Birds and the Bees when I post that review.)

Sophie isn’t perfect either, but she comes very close in the circumstances. I love her even though she's involved in the book’s two least-amusing moments, not one but two v-scenes. (Chick litty Sophies, in case you were wondering, are absolutely lovely, if you can overlook a tendency to throw tantrums in public places.) Fallon’s Sophie is intelligent, although her overly (but endearingly) trusting nature does mean she fails to notice that her new best friend ‘Eleanor’ is actually the woman her husband ran off with.

So the novel is very amusing, cleverer than it seems at first, and very enjoyable. It also ended in the way I was hoping it would. But if you want a meaty, satisfying read with strong characterisation and a main character who isn’t in with a chance of being arrested for stalking, this probably isn’t the book for you. If you don’t want those things, which a lot of people don’t, it’s perfect.

Chart Throb (Ben Elton)***

Ben Elton’s satire on The X Factor is extremely funny with some great characters. I haven’t watched much of The X Factor, and I don’t like the early stages where the judges are being wankers because they’re just really really mean. But it seems much funnier in a book.

Yes, Elton is making fun of real people. It’s not difficult at all to work out who the three judges are based on, but it’s more removed from laughing at real people and their dreams directly. I have to say, though, I actually prefer Rodney Root to his inspiration, Louis Walsh. Rodney has a wonderful air of incompetence that makes me want to hug him. I just love people who are less competent than me. I think I was supposed to dislike him and laugh at him, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying Rodney’s scenes. And maybe we are supposed to think he’s like Louis, but he actually reminds me of Andrew Whatsit – you know, the one who wasn’t George Michael - from Wham. As for the other judges, the horrible and lecherous Calvin Simms can only be based on one man, which leaves transsexual Beryl as an incarnation of… I’m sure you can guess.

The contestants are beautifully written as well. Even though I haven’t seen very much of the early stages, there is something very familiar about the pathetic inadequates who queue up to audition. Maybe even someone who didn’t know the programme at all would enjoy Elton’s clever and witty characterisations. Most people have met someone who could be described as desperate, and this is something that Elton portrays really well, in a variety of different ways.

But these people are not real characters: they are caricatures. Elton’s characters have almost no substance at all. It’s satisfying to read a chapter or two and get a good laugh about it, but, when it comes to developing storylines and characters, Chart Throb is lacking.

The audition stages take up most of the book. It annoyed me because I wanted to get the part that interest me most about X Factor style programmes. I was hoping that, once the finalists had been chosen, there would be more chance to get to know each character individually: a chance for them to turn into real characters instead of yet another stereotypical wannabe singer. But they never did. The live TV programmes did feature in the book, but were skimmed over in about half a page.

As a TV programme, The X Factor is, in a sense, a series of comic sketches with a few sob stories in between. And that’s fine. That sort of thing works really well on TV. But in a book, I want a little bit more than that. I want to know their inner thoughts, and not just about how they ‘want it so much’ because that’s kind of obvious. I like to get to know characters in a book… and I want to like them. There are plenty of poor pathetic sad people in Chart Throb whom I can’t quite bring myself to hate, but very few I like.

Elton’s contestants do have some very interesting back stories, but we find this out because Elton – or one of the judges - tells us. There’s little opportunity for us to watch them in action and draw our own conclusions. The contestants include the anorexic Georgie, a brave and certainly realistic addition to the story, but, in keeping with the spirit of the book, her situation was treated in a rather offhand fashion, so some of the impact was lost. I did feel more interested in Georgie than some of the others, and I almost got to like her, but there were so many characters, there wasn’t space in the book to get to know each one.

There is one human character in the book – Emma, who works on the production team. In many ways, the technical side is the most interesting part of the book. This look at the behind-the-scenes life was fascinating and not unconvincing. But only Emma really seems to have a life beyond the show, and that’s probably only because she gets sacked. Emma is a nice girl, but she very quickly succumbs to a case of Chick Lit Heroine Stupidity Syndrome. And then I stopped liking her. Once Emma has failed to kick Calvin Simms up the bum, there’s really no hope for her.

So, what were the finalists like? Who was the cutie, and who was the best singer? In other words, who was Leon and who was Rhydian? I’d like to tell you, but I don’t know. The people who seemed to be the best singers didn’t make it into the Final. I have no idea if most of the finalists can even sing, and I didn’t really care who won. There was one contestant who seemed a very nice person, so I suppose I wanted him to win more than the others, but I knew that, if he did win, Calvin would get away with something absolutely unspeakable, and Emma would be made to look even more of a twat than she did already.

And as for the big twist at the end – ridiculous. It did include a genuinely chilling moment, but there were two things wrong. Firstly – you don’t care whether the victim gets killed or not because it’s not like you like this person. Secondly – the twist stretches even my imagination too far. I suppose Elton really felt as though he needed a twist - one failing of the book was that judges were the people the book followed the most, and everything always seemed to be going more or less as planned for them. But Elton should have written a twist that was funny, believable, or ideally both. Not the crap thing he did choose. I wouldn’t mind so much, but Ben Elton is actually a really brilliant writer. He can do so much better than this (see Dead Famous), and I really wish he had.

The Girls (Lori Lansens)****

The Girls tells the story of twins Rose and Ruby, who are approaching their thirtieth birthday. But it is no ordinary story: the twins are joined at the head. Ruby’s legs are too small and weak to reach the ground, so Rose has to carry her everywhere they go.

It’s a shocking story in a way, but less so than you’d expect. I don’t think Lori Lansens is any kind of twin herself, and her acknowledgements suggest her knowledge of conjoined twins seems to come from books. So, as most people would say, it’s a very brave choice of subject.

However, in some ways, Lansens has played safe in choosing such an original and emotional subject. The subject would have been likely to provoke emotion in her readers whether the author writes well or not. I don’t like it when writers do this as a rule. I won’t be manipulated into getting emotionally involved with a story just because it’s got challenging subject matter. (Yes, Ian McEwan, I do mean you, and you’ll be hearing from me later.) It’s got to be a good book as well – well-written; characters who are interesting in their own right. Ideally, I like books to have plots too, and the weakness of The Girls is that there is no real plot – but it is written as the twins’ autobiography, and you wouldn’t normally expect someone’s life to be a plot, so the lack of plot in this case serves to make the book more realistic.

Rose and Ruby are very different characters: joined at the head, but with separate brains, thoughts, and feelings. I find Rose a more attractive character, but Ruby is very amusing. They make a really good pair of protagonists. I hate books when the characters are irritatingly good, but Lansens is not afraid to give her characters failings, and never suggests that either girl is perfect. Rose is clearly the more literary twin, but the sections told from Ruby’s point of view are also brilliantly done – Ruby is not a great or an enthusiastic writer, and it shows, but her simple, factual descriptions, used sparingly by Lansens, are very easy to read, and Ruby has as much a ‘voice’ as Rose.

It isn’t just the fact they are conjoined that makes Rose and Ruby interesting characters. It wouldn’t have been the same story if they had been separate, but their very strong personalities would have been exciting to read about in any book. I did feel sympathy for the twins, but mostly with their emotional trials – which are sometimes as a direct result of their physical condition, but not always. They have many of the same problems anyone else.

Maybe I’m a bitch. I never really felt any pity for Rose and Ruby. It seems really offensive to pity them. Their lives are challenging, but they are a lot more independent than I am. They live alone, and have jobs (not even the same jobs, although they obviously work in the same place), and have achieved a lot, both together and individually. They are admirable and inspiring and courageous, but in no way pitiful.

It usually annoys me when authors forget important things about their characters, but, as an emetophobic, I appreciate the fact that Lansens mostly seems to forget about Ruby’s chronic travel sickness. Lansens describes the incidents in her books so vividly – particularly when writing from Rose’s point of view – and there are parts of the early chapters of this book that I would rather not read again. All the same, it doesn’t bother me as much as most v-scenes do because it didn’t seem to be put in simply for effect or, worse, humour. It’s just a part of their lives. And that’s part of why I loved the book so much. Lansens doesn’t turn everything into a big drama because she realises it doesn’t feel like a big drama to Rose and Ruby. She tells the story simply, and that’s part of what makes it so powerful.

Have I Got Views for You (Boris Johnson)*****

Yes, I did notice this isn’t chick lit! But it was part of the 3for2 offer, and Boris Johnson is always adorable on Have I got News for You. Besides, I’d call myself a book fan, not a chick lit fan. And this is a book. Okay, maybe it isn’t a book, as it’s a collection of articles that were not written for any kind of book, but it is a book now.

It’s probably fair to say I know nothing about politics. I’m just not interested. That’s probably not a good thing to admit to as a general rule, but I’m not saying it to make myself sound cool, I’m making it to make the book sound cool, which is quite different.

The thing about Have I Got Views for You is that it was about something I wouldn’t usually find enjoyable, but I loved it anyway. It’s like Anybody Out There? with Anna’s makeup job. No, I haven’t got heavily involved in politics since reading this book. I’m too busy being heavily involved in reading. But I was interested in politics for the duration of this book, and I would most certainly consider reading another political book by Johnson in the future, and I think that is a sign that Have I Got Views for You is a great book because that’s what great books are supposed to do: give you access to a new world.

It’s not an autobiography, or any kind of story, unless it could be called the political story of Great Britain. Johnson wrote the articles for various papers throughout his career. But anyone who is a fan of Boris Johnson the person would probably enjoy this book because, without giving the impression that he has tried to make it all about him, Boris does have a starring role. And this is why I love the book. I love Boris, and I’m interested in what he has to say about anything. Despite the intelligence in his writing, you can see his bumbling character in every article, and I just want to give him a hug. (I’ve actually had a dream where I met Boris Johnson and asked him for a hug, but I don’t think it’s really the sort of thing I ought to try doing in real life.)

It does not seem as though Johnson aimed his articles at people who had little or no knowledge of politics. On the contrary, it does not seem in any way ‘dumbed down’, and covers some quite complicated issues. Very little is directly explained in a way that is likely to slow down and annoy a more knowledgeable reader. As I’m not a knowledgeable reader myself, I sometimes had to guess what Johnson was on about, but the book mostly made sense to me. Johnson is a wonderful writer. On Have I Got News for You, he’s not well-known for his ability to get a point across, but he does it beautifully in writing.

Johnson has also written fiction, which I haven’t read, but Have I Got Views for You suggests that he does this rather well. He captures the personalities of the people he meets in a really amusing yet usually affectionate way. Even those I haven’t heard of, I feel I do know a lot about when Johnson has finished with them. Those I do know are instantly recognisable. Johnson seems to enjoy meeting all kinds of people, even though he does sometimes feel like an idiot afterwards. And it’s great to find someone who agrees with me about Tony Blair, although the lovely Boris puts it far more kindly than I would. There’s just something remarkably inoffensive about Boris Johnson.

Of course, it must not be forgotten that politics is a matter of opinion, and that Johnson is almost certainly going to be biased in favour of the Tories almost all the time. If I read a book written by a highly literate and witty member of the Labour Party (if such a creature exists) about all the same incidents, it is possible I would appreciate their point of view too. But, as a form of literary entertainment, Have I Got Views for You is one of the finest books I have read.

Anybody Out There (Marian Keyes)*****

If Lucy in the Sky was the book that started me reading again, Anybody Out There was the book that made sure I didn’t stop. It is part of a series of books about five sisters, and, while it is not strictly a sequel, the beginning would have had more impact if I’d read about Anna before her depression in Marian Keyes’ previous books. Keyes’ wit, although undeniably brilliant, sometimes seems out of place in such a serious novel, and, to begin with, I didn’t feel nearly as close to Anna as I wanted to.

But that didn’t last. Anybody Out There is one of the most gripping and moving books I’ve ever read. Even though a lot of it is about makeup. Anna’s depression is realistically portrayed, and she is a loveable character once you’ve got used to the sudden switches between her deep unhappiness and her humorous way of looking at the world where she doesn’t sound depressed at all. But this is realistic too: you can have depression and a sense of humour at the same time. The only depressed people I’ve met who didn’t have a sense of humour probably never had one.

The book is full of twists and turns that I never expected, yet everything seems perfectly right once it’s happened. It was the sort of story where I wanted a perfect resolution, yet I felt this would be untrue to the spirit of the book if this actually happened. I won’t say how Keyes dealt with this problem, but it was ultimately one of the most satisfying books I have ever read.

Keyes’ characters are all great. Anna and her former lover Aidan have a great relationship that is very romantic, but never becomes embarrassing to read about. Some of their encounters are extermely amusing, starting from their very first meeting. But Keyes never lets you forget that it’s about to go wrong.

There are also a couple of hilarious subplots featuring Anna’s friend Jacqui and delightfully mad sister Helen. Their stories are very different from Anna’s, but do not seem out of place, and are, in many ways, a welcome relief from the misery, as well as a reminder that the whole world keeps going even when, to Anna, it seems like it’s over. These storylines also give Keyes the opportunity to use her full range of comedic writing talents. Anna’s whole family seems to be verging on insanity – and are consequently great fun to read about. I was glad to find out that Keyes has written other books about them. An earlier novel, Angels, starring Anna’s sister Maggie, probably the ‘sane’ one of the sisters, will be reviewed later.

In some ways, Anybody Out There doesn’t have a plot. It’s more Anna’s internal resolution of a problem than a story of outside events, although there certainly are plenty of those. But it works really well. There’s so much going on, all the time, even when Anna is just sitting and feeling sad. Loads of critics go on about how books are ‘remarkable achievements’ and I usually get really annoyed when I read them because, for me, there just isn’t anything special about it. So I don’t want to use this term ever because it’s misleading and I’d only ever condone its use if there’s something about the book that’s really really original and even then I wouldn’t want to use it myself in public.

But this time, I’m going to make an exception. Anybody Out There is officially a remarkable achievement.

A Crowded Marriage (Catherine Alliott)****

A Crowded Marriage is about another stupid girl. The only thing Imogen does well is getting herself into ridiculous situations, and then ensuring half the neighbourhood gets to hear about it. Anyone can accidentally end up in a bedroom with the guy you thought had only platonic feelings towards you. Probably a lot of people have got into a bit of a panic when apparently faced with the imminent death of someone else’s animal which you were supposed to be looking after.

But have you ever removed your knickers in the middle of a posh party? Okay, maybe some of you have, but I don’t mean for that reason. I mean for a totally innocent reason that makes perfect sense at the time, but looks extremely dodgy when the cute guy you’re not married to shows up.

In some ways, A Crowded Marriage is very similar to Lucy in the Sky and Holly’s Inbox. One difference is that the wanker is called Alex instead of James - which probably explains why I spent the entire book thinking Alex was not the right name for him. The other main difference is that it's a much better book.

Imogen’s fears about Alex’s infidelity probably aren’t as insane as they seem. After all, he has just moved them into a cottage on his beautiful ex-girlfriend’s property. And, not only is she a beautiful ex-girlfriend, she was the reason Alex’s first marriage broke up. But Imogen is so insane and obsessed and neurotic, you can’t help feeling she’s probably not the best judge of, well, anything.

But, to some extent, I didn’t care whether Alex was sleeping with the disgustingly perfect and irritatingly nice Eleanor or not. Alex is a total wanker who is very nasty to Imogen and very impatient with her stupidity, which he surely must have noticed before they got married considering she used to be his secretary. I really wanted her to ditch Alex and find someone better. And there do seem to be cute men all over the place in this novel.

Like Lucy in the Sky, there is the slight problem in that Imogen hasn’t been totally faithful herself. While she does claim to love Alex, there’s no denying that the local vet and her son’s headmaster make her very flustered. There’s nothing wrong with fancying other men when you’re married, but Imogen’s methods of showing friendliness are worryingly easy to misinterpret. I spent a lot of the book cringing for Imogen, and wanting to drag her away before she makes it worse. And I’m usually the person who’s being dragged away.

So why does A Crowded Marriage have four stars? Because it’s funny. You never know what mess Imogen is going to get herself into next, and even when you can see a twist coming a mile of, Catherine Alliott ensures it’s still great fun to read about, and usually throws something extra into the story to surprise you.

Imogen can be a shock till you’ve got used to her, but she’s a lovely and well-intentioned girl whose only fault is that she’s on the dim side even for a chick lit heroine. Give it 3-4 chapters, and she’ll start being adorable. You’ll even forgive her for being a beautiful snob – she’s so delightfully incompetent about it. She makes me feel rational and capable and socially competent. I love her.

Holly's Inbox (Holly Denham)***

Holly’s Inbox is one of the most fascinating books I’ve read. It’s just a shame I didn’t enjoy it much. It started off when Holly Denham, a real person, made a website of her ‘real’ work e-mails. It was hugely popular, so Denham made the e-mails into a novel.

The first novels ever written were in letters, so it’s nice to see a return to the old form, which still works. I’d be interested in reading more novels based on e-mails. There must be loads of stories that can be told in this way. Denham, sadly, has not used the idea to its full potential, but it is still a very enjoyable novel. The only problem is that Holly is another of these unintelligent heroines. Why can’t someone write about an intelligent girl for a change?

I don’t know how realistic Holly’s workplace is, but it seems convincing to me. Most of the characters come over convincingly in their e-mails – Denham has very cleverly managed to make certain people’s personalities clear even when they’re pretending to be nice. The only problem character, apart from Holly herself, is James, her work colleague and boyfriend. (see Lucy in the Sky: are all the evil men in women’s fiction called James?) Holly’s James is a perverted wanker.

Holly seems a bit shallow and maybe on the tarty side, but the book isn’t short of good characters. Office bitch Shella, nicknamed ‘Cruella’ is brilliantly written. Holly has a wonderful pair of friends: Jason, who is lovely, warm and somehow totally camp even in writing, and the adorable Aisha, who amazingly, doesn’t come across as being tarty even though that’s probably a fair description of her, considering what she gets up to and how often. And then there’s Holly’s demented family, who go a long way towards making Holly look sane.

Another slight disappointment is that, even though Denham shows a lot about the different characters through their vocabulary, they all seem to use punctuation in exactly the same way. As punctuation is not set in stone, and there are so many correct/acceptable ways of using it, it would have been nice to see more of them. But I’m a geek. Normal people probably don’t think about things like that.

Finally, being restricted to work e-mails, the book does have its limitations. Occasional interesting but irrelevant detours are made to the Inbox of Holly’s lovely workmate, Trisha, in what seems to be an attempt to flesh out the story with serious issues. And, while the storyline that interested me most was resolved, I didn’t get to see it happen.

But there is a lot to enjoy in Holly’s highly diverse e-mail correspondence, and it works as a book amazingly well considering it wasn’t originally conceived as one. An Inbox wouldn’t usually have a plot, but Denham’s book does. And Denham's second book, Holly's Inbox: Scandal in the City, is even better.

Me and Mr Darcy (Alexandra Potter)*

It’s every girl’s dream.

Usually, when I read a book about ‘every girl’s dream’, I find one of my nightmares. But this one I can relate to. Meeting Mr Darcy… Mr Darcy falling in love with me… I’ve had lots of daydreams about that. Some of them were probably not unlike what happens to Emily in this book.

But somehow, a dream I’ve had in my head doesn’t look so good now Alexandra Potter has put down on paper. Of course Mr Darcy wouldn’t really do all the things I dreamed him doing. The most I could get out of him is a dance at the ball – if I was lucky. But the idea that Mr Darcy might come tapping on Emily’s window to invite her for a midnight ride, and then stop in the middle of nowhere to have a romantic picnic – no. It would never cross his mind. Even a modern-day Mr Darcy wouldn’t try something as potentially dodgy as that. And a modern day Elizabeth Bennet wouldn’t be stupid enough to go.

It’s quite difficult to believe that Mr Darcy would be attracted to Emily in the first place. She’s terminally stupid. She smokes dope to look cool. If she was a teenager behind the bike sheds, I might forgive her, just, but she’s an adult woman on a Jane Austen book tour. She should know better.

The book tour does sound quite fun, but Emily doesn’t seem overly committed to it. Either she’s hungover, or she’s exhausted, or she wanders away from her group. She’s not the sort of person I’d expect to enjoy Jane Austen’s novels – it’s a miracle she can read at all.

Clearly, Alexandra Potter sees Emily as a sort of futuristic Elizabeth Bennet. Maybe the book would have been more successful if Emily’s comparisons of herself with Elizabeth hadn’t been so widely off the mark as to be laughable. But Mr Darcy’s affection for Emily can only suggest Potter is taking it seriously. It’s true that many of Emily’s misadventures bear a striking similarity to some of the things that happen to Elizabeth. Perhaps I’m a snob, but I felt hugely offended on Jane Austen’s behalf when reading Potter’s equivalent of the scene where Elizabeth hears Darcy’s early opinion of her looks. Spike (Emily’s other bloke: more about him in a minute) is talking about Emily into a mobile phone as Emily… hovers over a toilet seat, urinating.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! Jane Austen heroines don’t go to the toilet!

Spike is the other Mr Darcy character. He is also on the tour, albeit as a journalist rather than an Austen fan. He and Emily completely fail to hit it off. The ‘relationship’ if it can be termed that (they sneer at one another rather than actually conversing) is far more convincing and interesting than Emily’s relationship with Mr Darcy. In many ways, it is also closer to the original Elizabeth and Darcy relationship, as there is a lot of pride and prejudice going on. Emily and Spike are significantly less intelligent versions of Elizabeth and Darcy, but, although you can’t help feeling that Spike could do a lot better, some of their altercations are very entertaining. And you have to love Spike for telling Emily what a stupid cow she is. Go Spike!

Me and Mr Darcy is not without strong points, but Potter really tries to do too much at once. Clueless, a modern cinema remake of Emma, also features less intelligent characters, but is still extremely enjoyable and successful. Clueless is Emma – but the characters don’t know it’s Emma. The writers don’t ram it down your throat. Me and Mr Darcy would be more successful if Emily wasn’t comparing her situation to Elizabeth Bennet’s every five minutes. The Pride and Prejudice connections would probably have been funnier if the readers had been left to work them out for themselves.

It’s not as though the Mr Darcy sections really achieved something. Emily doesn’t learn anything about herself through her encounters with him. True, she does make a few decisions about what she wants from life, but she seems to have got those ideas from Spike. And there’s no point in putting Mr Darcy in a book if he’s not going to behave like Mr Darcy.

Mr Darcy is every girl’s dream – and that’s how he should stay.

Lucy in the Sky (Paige Toon)***

Lucy in the Sky isn’t the best book in the world, but it was the book that made me start reading again. It was my English teachers who forced me to give up: it’s just so hard to enjoy a book when you’re forced to pretend everyone has a sexual repression problem.

Lucy is happily on her way to Australia to see her old school friends, who are about to get married. She receives a text message telling her that her boyfriend James has been unfaithful. Cue shock, horror, and a totally unnecessary vomit scene (as an emetophobic, I have a deep dislike of anything connected to the v-word, but Paige Toon wasn’t to know).

When I got this far (v-scene notwithstanding), I was thrilled. I thought the whole book was going to be Lucy stuck on a plane wondering what kind of man she’s really shacked up with. I thought it was going to be the most amazing book I’d ever read. But Lucy gets off the plane a few pages later, phones James, and he denies it.

Lucy is a lovely character. Her stupidity becomes endearing, and her stomach proves extremely strong as a general rule, despite an inordinate number of drunken nights out. Some of her escapades are very amusing and wonderfully inventive – particularly her description of Lucy’s girls’ nights out. I don’t know how realistic they are because most of my friends are male, but this book seriously made me think about ditching my guy friends and going to find myself some girly mates. The best character is Lucy’s brilliantly scary boss, Mandy – she’s not as scary as Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada, but she comes close.

But the men are a bit of a problem. Lucy wonders about the text message for months – but I don’t understand why she’s so bothered. It doesn’t matter if James has been unfaithful: Lucy should kick him out just because he’s a wanker. And it’s not like she’s a good girl exactly. The whole time she’s wondering, she’s also got this flirtation going on with a guy called Nathan – the younger brother of one of the friends who got married. Given the choice of James and Nathan, I’d personally have gone for Lucy’s sweet workmate Chloe, but maybe that’s just me.

Throughout the story, things kept happening that I thought I didn’t like, but it didn’t actually stop me from reading, and I actually ended up enjoying it. Even though I couldn’t stand James, I did want to know whether he had been unfaithful or not. And, while I’m not really sure why Lucy and Nathan are so good for each other (there is the small problem where they live on the other side of the world from each other that is never really resolved), they do seem to make one another happy. There are so many books out there where the hero and heroine spend the whole time having slanging matches. This can work very well – a more restrained version of the slanging match can be seen in Pride and Prejudice – but it’s nice to see the tension in the book coming from another quarter for a change, just giving you the chance to read about two people who click from the start.