Great Reads for Great Readers

 

The Party Crasher, by Sophie Kinsella.

 

   

       Aahh, Chick Lit:  where would we be without it? – the stories that are lighter than air, have predictable, clearly-defined characters (you always know who the heroine is going to end up with), and a compulsory happy ending.

            And there’s nothing wrong with that!  As far as I’m concerned, Chick Lit plays a very important part for the Dedicated Reader:  after wading through some very serious, worthy stuff lately, it was great to have a complete change of scene – to be entertained.  And Sophie Kinsella is just the writer to do it. 

            Effie Talbot is still not over the recent breakup of her parent’s marriage, even though she and her siblings are adults in their 20’s and 30’s. The fact that her dad has recently acquired a girlfriend fills her with fear and dread – not to mention loathing, for new girlfriend Krista seems to be ruling the roost, the roost being the old family home, a local eccentric landmark that everyone adored, full of secret cupboards, hidey-holes and attics, the perfect place for children to create wonderful childhood memories – but not any more:  Krista has put it up for sale, along with various beloved items of furniture that the siblings believed to be theirs.  And because Effie is known for speaking her mind (in a Bull-in-a-China-shop way) she has fallen out with dad, and no longer visits the family home.  Worse still, she hasn’t received an official invitation to the ‘House-Cooling’ party to which absolutely everyone (including her beloved ex-boyfriend) has been invited. 

            What to do?  For Effie has a little treasure that she wants to retrieve from the house herself, something most precious that she hid after her break-up with Joe:  can she sneak in while the neighbourhood is carousing, find her keepsake, then sneak out again undiscovered like cat-burglars do in the movies?

            Of course not.  Effie’s presence is almost revealed several times, and only prevented by her expert knowledge of all the various hidey-holes she still remembers – but along the way she is forced to eavesdrop on some very frank conversations regarding her character, and the real reasons for the sale of their beloved home.  And there are previously unknown revelations about her brother and sister’s lives that come as a shock – she isn’t the only one who has had it rough lately.

            Sophie Kinsella pulls off an impossible plot beautifully because her characters are so funny that the reader is happy to suspend disbelief;  she’s one of the Queens of Chick Lit:  long may she write and reign!  FOUR STARS.