Not the kind of Prince Charming I'd like to meet (This Charming Man - Marian Keyes)

Member Name: nazc1

Product:	This Charming Man - Marian Keyes
Date:	07/09/09 (62 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: A 850+ page book so good value for money

Disadvantages: Some quite deep issues that may take a whie to get in to

I first picked this book up because I'd read and enjoyed Marian Keyes offerings before and I thought it was great value for money being nearly 900 pages in length!
I read the blurb on the back and thought it was going to be your typical chick lit read but how wrong I was. This book in no way is superficial, touching on far deeper issues. To be honest if I'd have realised the book contained themes of politics, alcoholism and domestic violence, I may well have not picked it up but I'm glad I did.

'Everyone remembers where they were the day they heard that Paddy De Courcy was getting married' so starts the book.
Paddy De Courcy is a prominent politician in a leading Irish party, very popular with his constituents and charming to those he meets, that's how it appears on the surface anyway but the book follows the story of three main ladies that have connections with Paddy and their reaction to the news he's getting married.

The book is divided in sections each headed by one of the three ladies. I thought this was a very clever way of developing their experiences and highlighting although they were all very different individually they all shared a connection to Paddy that revealed a dark secret. At the end of some of the sections there are anonymous descriptions of events that have there identity revealed later on in the story.

First off is Lola Daly, a popular stylist working in Dublin who should be surprised that Paddy's getting married as she is his girlfriend and she's definitely not the one that's going to be choosing bridal wear! In order to ease the pain and shock of the news she heads off to the Irish countryside to her friends relatives holiday home and hence set the scene for meeting some random people that slowly become her friends and help her 'get over' Paddy.
Lola's sections are written in a diary format and I must admit it did take me a while to get used to this style of writing. Some parts of it are almost in note form and the sentence construction can take it's toll at times. I did wonder what I'd let myself in for but after abut 15 or so pages I had settled into it and read it with ease.
Her observations on things are quite light hearted and some of the 'friends' she meets on her retreat add a lot of humour into the book. If anyone has ever had the unfortunate experience of being duped by a bloke then you might be able to empathise with some of the crazy things that Lola goes through in her recovery!
It took me a while to warm to Lola's character and I think this had something to do with the writing style but at the end of the book I think she was my favourite character as I found her honest, funny and a little ditzy!

Next we meet Grace, a journalist who is interested in getting some inside information off Lola about her relationship with Paddy. However there's more to it as Grace knew Paddy from her childhood and has other connections that are slowly revealed. Its hard to say to much about Grace really without giving the tale away but she has a partner who is a journalist for another top Irish paper and mixed in to the main story is the battle Grace's aunt Bid is having with lung cancer. Because of this Grace and her partner decide to give up smoking as moral support which provides another area people can identify with!
Grace's tale is written in more of a traditional style and straight away you get the impression she is quite hard nosed when it comes to her job but this means she gets the results, well usually but she struggles in Lola's case.
Initially I thought that Grace would be your typical celebrity journalist but I was proved wrong, she obviously had a passion for her job, for getting the story out there and trying to get justice for the people but I think the interaction we saw with her family helped paint a different side to her and although she often came across quite hard we do get to see a softer side of Grace that warms you to her.

Grace's twin sister is Marnie Hunter and we meet her next. She is a wife and mother to two girls with a job in an Estate Agents, everything seems great but it isn't. Marnie struggles with feelings of inadequacy and guilt throughout the book and finds she can cope better once she's had a drink or two. This creates all manner of problems which we get to read about and we learn that ever since splitting up from her first love as a teenager , Master Paddy De Coucy himself Marnie has struggled with her feelings.
Although Marnie's sections are written in the third person, hence more traditional, at times I struggled. I think this was because the descriptions of her feelings are quite intense and the whiny, low self esteem gets to you after a while. I don't wish to sound harsh as I know people with similar feelings but sometimes you want to just grab her by the shoulders and shake her into action! I guess however that this really is testimony to the level of writing ability as it really does take you to the depths of despair that Marnie is feeling.
Marnie was probably the character I identified with least but as the story progress you do feel an understanding of what's made Marnie the way she is and you almost forgive her got that.

We also briefly meet Alicia who is Paddy De Courcy's fiancée, however the first time we hear off her she admits 'it would have been nice if he'd asked me first!' This paints a picture of their relationship in just one sentence and although you think she'd be a central character being the fiancée of the leading man we hardly hear from her at all.

There are numerous other supporting characters, including cross dressers, political leading ladies and the local village idiots all of whom link the themes of the book and the characters together.

Ive found this book quite hard to review as if you go in to to much detail you really would be giving a lot of the story away but in summary I would say once you get into it, the book is fantastic and although some parts were difficult to read, both in writing style and in the content it expresses, you just have to get to the end. Once there you don't feel cheated in any way and it made me think about these issues in ways I maybe never would otherwise.

I would warn potential readers that some parts of the book are a little descriptive in terms of domestic violence and although I don't feel I'm particularly sensitive, I was a little troubled at times, more in the fact you know that Marian Keyes has got these experiences from women that have had to deal with it in real life and that unfortunately these things really do happen. However I think she has done well to get the balance of fact with sensitivity.

I would recommend this book but with a warning that it is very different from her previous books and it might take a little while to get into!

Summary: Worth a read but needs perseverance initially to get into it!