Remember Me?
by Sophie Kinsella
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Book Reviews of Remember Me?
Book Review: Sophie Kinsella breathes new life into cliched plot
Summary: 4 Stars
True to form, Kinsella delivers her signature humor, smart dialogue and totally relatable characters in this amnesiac adventure. When Lexi Smart wakes up in a posh private wing of a London hospital, the last thing she can remember is falling down a flight of steps while chasing a taxi after a long, disappointing day in which she is stood up for a date, overlooked for a bonus and emotionally wearied by her own unremarkable life. The only hitch is that night happened three years prior, and in the interim she has apparently pulled her act together, made herself over, picked up a hot multi-millionaire husband and alienated all her old friends with her driving ambition. She sets off to rediscover her recent past and figure out who she really is, and in the meantime learns some surprising truths about who she thought she was.
Kinsella writes Lexi with the same girl-next-door appeal as her Shopaholic series, voicing her self-doubts, getting her into embarrassing scrapes and delineating her charachter with true-to-life emotions until she could be any one of us. It's easy to identify with Lexi's initial wonder at her beautiful new life, her helpless confusion at being held accountable for a past she can't remember, and her gradual reawakening as she finds her past is secondary in importance to what she does with her present.
It's not a generation-defining bestseller, but compared to most of the offerings in the ever more annoying ChickLit genre, it's smart, funny and an entertaining read.
Book Review: I expected more...
Summary: 3 Stars
As a fan of Sophie Kinsella's Shopaholic series I was really looking forward to reading her other books. This one was somewhat of a let down though. Lexi, the main character, was not nearly as likable as Becky Bloomwood (from the Shopaholic series) and I was frustrated throughout the book with her lack of honesty to herself. Many things are obvious right away to the reader, but it takes Lexi much too long to figure things out for herself.
Also, I'm surprised there haven't been many (if any) complaints about the end of the book. I suppose it is somewhat of a "happy ending" but ****** SPOILERS ****** what about her memory? I assumed throughout the story that she was eventually going to have that moment where all her memories came rushing back. Yet it never came. All those memories she had with Jon are gone. I realize there is still the possibility that she could get her memory back later, but I'm disappointed Kinsella didn't wrap up the ending with Lexi recovering the last three years of her life. Sure, there are probably parts of it she'd like to forget, but there's probably a lot worth remembering. For me, the ending was disappointing, to say the least. ****** END SPOILERS ******
"Remember Me?" had its share of humorous moments though. I did laugh out loud quite a few times. And up until the end I was pretty pleased with the book. However, I expected more and was left unsatisfied.
Book Review: Remember Me?
Summary: 5 Stars
Kudos to Sophie Kinsella for taking a soap-operatic topic like memory loss and turning it into a fully non-cliched book! Not only that, she takes the usually flat genre of chick-lit and brings in a massive dose of suspense, leaving the reader positively on their toes trying to find out what happens next. While many chick-lit books may have interesting plots and plot twists, none of them really brings in an element of mystery, from what I've read so far, at least. It was slightly difficult, although necessary to the plot, to read about the snobbery of life as a high-upper, but again, that was the entire point of the book, to make the reader feel as uncomfortable as Lexi must have been. The ending was great--I'm sure everyone expected, particularly by the misleading summary on the book cover, Lexi to regain her memory. Kinsella brings her memory back, but only a flash, and the subject of the tiny flash is what makes it so poignant. The novel would have been destroyed had Kinsella brought her entire memory back, it would nullify the point of the whole book--Lexi finding herself. The most notable aspect of the book to me was the abundance of amazing references that, for once, I actually understood. I think this contained the most amazing HP reference ever, as well as good ones to The West Wing, Coldplay, and 'Bad Day' (it really truly WAS the song everyone was singing back then!)
Rating: 4.5/5
Book Review: Good But Not Great Kinsella
Summary: 4 Stars
There is a book by Agatha Christie titled Why Didn't They Ask Evans? My main thought as I finished this book was why didn't Lexi confide in Fi, her best friend since childhood. If she had, things would undoubtedly have been better for her. Or at least her other old friends might have understood. . .
I have to agree with Cordelia that I was disappointed in Lexi for having an affair. She seemed a much more decent type than that. I don't get any sense of characters being churchgoers at all, but surely they've heard of the commandment Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery. Falling in love with Jon is understandable, given her total incompatability with Eric. Having an affair is not.
ChicBookFiend made a good point when she said that this book is similar to 13 Going on 30. Both heroines have discovered that they have become beautiful and successful, but they seem to have turned into bitches and try to learn how it happened. I think it's nicely done in this book. And, as it turns out, the reason is a totally logical one.
This was a nice enjoyable read, and I look forward to sharing it with my friends. However, I'm looking forward to the Shopaholic movie (and I think Isla Fisher will make a great Becky, although I'd have loved to see Christian Bale as Luke) and hopefully another Shopaholic book (Shopaholic & Daughter perhaps?) soon.
Book Review: Remember who?
Summary: 3 Stars
It was with great hopes that I picked up this book at the library the other day. I was looking forward to reading this especially since I loved "The Undomestic Goddess." I had read the first few books of the Shopoholic Series, which was ok, but got tedious after awhile. I mean, how can you keep writing about shopping so many time? Anyhow, I picked up this book and it sounded so promising. What is there not to like about waking up in the hospital and finding yourself a more gorgeous, thinner self than you were three years previous, which was the last thing you remembered? And being married to a gorgeous bloke with a lot of money. Wow!
After Lexi leaves the hospital to the gorgeous flat she shares with her husband, Eric, she struggles to remember who she was before the accident. There is a teaser that there was something big about her past, which was provided by Jon, Eric's architect. That teaser was a bust because there were all this built-up to it but led to nothing more than just an affair.
The book is ok. It is entertaining. It is quick. But it is definitely not like her other stand-alone novels. If you want a fun read, I would definitely recommend "The Undomestic Goddess." That one is still my favorite of her books. Just save your hard-earned pennies and borrow this one from the library. You'll be glad that you did.
3/10/08