The Wonder Spot

Book #15 - The Wonder Spot, by Melissa Bank

Let's just start off by lamenting the fact that I'm going to be a minimum of eight books off my (stupidly easy) goal of 25 for the year. That is sad and pathetic, but I'm planning to do penance by adding whatever I've got remaining this year to my 25 for next year. Someday, I will stop watching so much Intervention and Top Chef, and start on my two full shelves of unread books.

A little time in the airport and on the plane to Chicago and back (hi Maya!) was the perfect amount of time in which to read The Wonder Spot. This is the second novel by Melissa Bank, the author of The Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing, which Sandy posted about earlier this year. This novel follows the same narrative style - short vignettes about one woman at various points in her life. It's chick lit in that it's by and about a chick, and she dates people. That's pretty much the model, right?

Well, to be more specific, the model is something like: "Girl is underappreciated and underpaid at the law office / publishing house / ad firm where she works, but at least she's got her gay best friend who helps Girl shop for shoes so that she looks fabulous for her date with Dream Guy who is in fact not as wonderful as he seems, but in the meantime Good Buddy is waiting in the wings and it turns out he is in fact her perfect match."

Thankfully, Melissa Bank avoids most of those traps. There is no one guy waiting in the wings for Sophie. There are many guys, all shapes and ages, all of them a little wrong in their own ways. Even in the end, it's not clear that Sophie has found happily ever after. Instead, to quote a chick lit fave, she's found "happy right now." OK, seriously, the book is not as cheesy as it sounds.

But it's impossible not to compare it with Girl's Guide, and I found it less 3-dimensional. The characters and the world they inhabit seemed less real and less engaging. It's a good read, but I hope that Melissa Bank tries something new with her next book, because I think she's got it in her.