Book Review: Eleanor Rigby by Douglas Coupland
Where do they all come from?
"Eleanor Rigby", John Lennon/Paul McCartney
For Liz Dunn, life is fairly routine, dull and lonely. She's single, overweight, works a fairly tedious job and tries to put on a comrade-like face when dealing with co-workers. She doesn't realize how stuck in a rut she is until a Vancouver hospital calls, saying that a young man has been admitted, and the only number he carries happens to be hers. She visits him in the hospital and takes a chance on him, allowing the charming young man with strange, apocalyptic visions of farmers, into her home, changing her outlook of loneliness and life forever.
Eleanor Rigby weaves a fun tale of a woman overcoming her self-made obstacles to regain the life she thought she would never have. As Liz begins to learn more about the mysterious young man, she re-examines her teen years, realizing her life wasn't as bad as she makes it out to be. She traveled to Europe on her own, made a fairly decent amount of money in the stock market, and has a secret that at one time, she thought would be her undoing but instead has made her a better person. I like that she grows as the story progresses, and as a reader, I can see the changes as she becomes more outgoing and learns to allow others into her life rather than keeping them at a distance. Oh, and her conversations with the young stranger are wonderfully written, the kind of talks I wish I could have with people, saying whatever comes to mind and not feeling judged for it.
This is the first book I've read this year which put a smile on my face as I closed the cover. It's well worth reading, and I recommend it highly.
Eleanor Rigby
by Douglas Coupland
Bloomsbury
ISBN: 1-58234-523-6
hardcover, 249 pgs.
purchased book
Image from Sam Weller's Bookstore.
6 comments:
This sounds interesting - thanks! The Beatles title also got me!
Thank you for the recommendation. This sounds like something right up my alley. I will add it to my wish list.
My problem with Coupland is that after you read two or three of them, you realize that all of his books are almost exactly the same. I once wrote a "Douglas Coupland Random Plot/Character Generator" for laughs - I should look for it. :)
Even though I make fun of him, I still read everything he puts out, so that must say something about his appeal to me personally. I haven't gotten to _Player One_ yet, but I just finished _Generation A_ and really disliked it. All his other fiction has at least been entertaining and engaging enough for me to finish with no problem, but _Generation A_ was an ordeal.
SteveA and Rick: if you decide to read it, I hope you enjoy it, too.
mike.: Some authors are like that for me, as well. Dean Koontz and John Saul come to mind. The first few books were enjoyable but then the next seemed to follow a formula, and I lost interest quickly. I enjoyed this first Coupland book and plan on trying a few more of his books. I may steer clear of Generation A, though.
i was a big fan from the release of generation X, through shampoo planet, life after god, microserfs and polaroids from the dead. (i even read all of microserfs on the plane moving from canada to silicon valley which was midly prophetic as i got to meet him at a reading a few weeks later.)
but then he became big and the next few novels (girlfriend in a coma and miss wyoming) read like first drafts and that the editors were too scared to tell him to tighten up his thoughts and prose.
i couldn't get past the first two chapters of all families are psychotic and promptly gave up on his writing. his short articles for newspapers and magazines had the same faults for me.
surprisingly i found the artwork he was doing in this period much more interesting.
when jpod came out it had some good reviews calling it a return to form, so i picked it up. i wish i hadn't.
I just put the free sample on my Kindle. Will give it a try. Sounds good.
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