By Flora Hardy, Senior Account Manager
Written by American novelist Curtis Sittenfeld, the book is a love letter to the original Rom-Com.
The story is based on the familiar theory that funny men can date women way out of their league, but the same isn’t true for funny women. This unfolds when Sally, a witty and successful comedy writer on the fictional equivalent of Saturday Night Live meets Noah, a super-hot, one hit wonder pop star, who is guest-starring on the show that week.
It’s the usual trope we’ve seen time and time again in the likes of Judd Apatow’s Knocked Up or Woody Allen’s Annie Hall. But Curtis manages a fresh take on the well-worn genre by offering a female lead who “isn’t flawless but also isn’t ridiculous or incompetent at life” and a male counterpart who is genuinely a good guy. Men aren’t trash in this book and I’m here for it!
As a hopeless romantic myself, I was totally hooked on the ‘will they, won’t they’ but inevitable ‘of course they will’ friction between Sally and Noah. This really heats up in the second part of the book; a long email exchange between Sally and Noah during lockdown. The pandemic becomes the perfect backdrop to modern dating and the email chain lets you obsess over every word, just like you would with a friend over a glass of wine.
But don’t expect any twists or turns. There’s no catastrophe keeping star crossed lovers apart. The book is a good old fashioned and feel-good tale of falling in love. The characters are reassuringly relatable, and I can’t forget to mention that its genuinely very funny.
An ‘easy read’ is such an unflattering description of a book, and certainly not reflective of Curtis’ impressive repertoire, which I now can’t wait to get stuck into. I prefer to say comfort reading and Romantic Comedy is exactly that – the perfect holiday companion.