Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
For the past couple of months, I kept hearing great things about this book. It certainly was getting a lot of buzz in the book circles so I was anxious to read it. However, after finishing it I have to say that I think it was more 'book hype' than 'book buzz.' I wanted to love this book, but was disappointed almost immediately.
Here's a quick overview (see any of the other reviews for MANY more details...) -- Sally is a writer for The Night Owls (think SNL). She meets Noah, who is the guest host/musical guest for the week. They work together writing a skit. Sparks fly. Nothing happens.
The book is divided into three sections: the first section is 130 pages and goes into WAY too much detail about the SNL-like happenings. TOO much inside baseball for me! To be honest, I was ready to ditch it after the first 50 pages. Fast forward two years and the next section is an epistolary form with emails between the two of them during the beginning of the pandemic. Section three is a couple of weeks later when she visits him in LA.
The book redeemed itself for me in sections two and three. I'm glad I finished it but it was still a disappointment. I didn't like the over emphasis on COVID (aren't we all trying to forget it and get back to normal life?). The story line was not interesting. There didn't seem to be much character development. And the dialog was flat. Overall, I cannot recommend it.
Read more of my reviews at https://thegoodreader13.blogspot.com/.
View all my reviews
