Do not tell handsome strangers your secrets (Can you Keep A Secret? - Sophie Kinsella)

Member Name: Maiakins

Product:	Can you Keep A Secret? - Sophie Kinsella
Date:	11/09/03 (128 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Easy-to-read

Disadvantages: Not hilariously funny

What is a girl to do? One minute you are sipping champagne in business class on a plane, reading a Cosmo article on 30 Things to Do Before You?re 30, the next minute your plane hits turbulence and is plummeting out of the sky.

If you were Emma Corrigan (the central character), you would start spilling your secrets to the handsome stranger sitting next to you: I have not climbed a mountain. I have not got a tattoo. I do not even know if I have got a G-spot.

She goes on, blabbing all her secrets. About how she feels about her family, her colleagues, her body and her boyfriend.

The flight lands safely and Emma forgets about the incident. That is until she runs into the handsome stranger at her workplace. It turns out that the handsome stranger is the uberboss of the company. And he has an excellent memory when it comes to her secrets!

** WHO SHOULD OR SHOULD NOT READ THIS? **
First of all, let me say that if you do not like chick-lit, you will hate this! It is no Dostoevsky or Tolkien, that is for sure. I am not a really ardent feminist, but I did feel somewhat irritated with Emma at first ? her ditzy nature and her inability to speak up for herself. I found it difficult to warm to her during the first 100 pages, but by the end she had become more feisty and likeable.

However, if you are looking for an easy-to-read book for sunbathing on the beach, Can you keep a secret? is for you. But a word of warning. Do not take this on holiday with you if you are frightened of flying. I waited until I got back before reading this, because I am the worlds most nervous flyer, and I knew from reading the back cover that the book would open with a long description of turbulence and air panic. Not what I needed.

This book is riding high in the Bestseller chart at the moment, probably due to the army of fans who love Sophie Kinsellas other books (the Shopaholic series). If you are a Kinsella fan, you will be well pleased with
her latest offering.

** MY OPINION **
I am not giving away anything when I say that this book is a love story. The handsome stranger (Jack Harper) plays a brooding Mills and Boon type character (wealthy, older man who gives nothing away but stares with passionate dark eyes).

Indeed, the plot owes much to Mills and Boon (albeit with cappuccinos, Gucci bags and the like). Boy meets girl, girl works for boy and falls in love with boy, but things do not work smoothly. We all know the story and how it is going to end. But just because it is predictable, that doesn?t make it any less enjoyable. There are plenty of twists and turns along the way. It is the process of getting there that is so enjoyable. I surprised myself by actually getting really into this. In fact, I have just finished reading the last 50 pages in the bath and when I finally finished, realised the water was completely cold and I looked like a prune!

There are various other sub-plots, like Emmas relationship with her family. And with her flatmates. Neither of which are that interesting, in my opinion. I tended to skip over these bits. The only sub-plot I enjoyed was Emmas hate-hate relationship with her office colleagues and all the bickering and back-stabbing.

It is supposed to be a fun book, and I did find bits of it mildly amusing, but never laugh-out-loud funny like similar books, Bridget Jones (Helen Fielding) or I don?t know how she does it (Allison Pearson). Talking of books turning to films, apparently Paramount Pictures have bought the rights to this novel, and it will star Kate Hudson as Emma.

In short, if you are looking for a richly textured plot and characters with substance, you will be disappointed. But if you want to escape into a world of chick-lit fun, you cannot do much better than this delightfully junky summer holiday read.

** PRICE **
Sells for £6.99 in most bookstores, although Amazon is currently selling it for £3.
49 (half price). See: www.amazon.co.uk

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