Chick lit? More like curmudgeon lit—and it couldn't be funnier in this wry, quirky sequel to Welcome to My Planet (Where English Is Sometimes Spoken)
. Thirty-something Shannon Olson, who shares her name with the author, is napping her way through life in her native Minneapolis, kvetching with her equally stymied friends and dabbling in group therapy. She envies her married-and-settled siblings and longs to break away from her parents—but how to develop her own identity when she's still doing laundry at her folks' and sharing every detail of her life with her mother, the indomitable Flo? Her romantic prospects look bleak, too: "I had been living in the dating world's version of the Old Country Buffet.... The tepid, lamp-warmed, greasy, convenient, heartburn-inducing singles buffet." With so few possibilities, her dearest friend from college, Adam, starts to look less like her favorite couch potato companion and more like the love of her life—or is it only boredom drawing her to him? This is no paint-by-numbers tale of woe; while Shannon herself shies from action, the plot is one twist after another, and the humor (especially the group therapy scenes) is hilarious. Eschewing much of the chirpiness and lagging introspection of many of its sisters, Olson's novel explores deeper questions of why many young adults find themselves acting like adolescents into their 30s and offers an insightful examination of friendship and family. Strong, ironic and characteristically cranky prose keeps the pages turning, and Shannon's commentary on being a round peg in a square world—guiltily Catholic in a world of cheery Lutherans, grumpy and single in a city clogged with strollers and Midwestern cheer—rings true. (Feb.)
Forecast:
This novel deserves a wider audience than just chick-lit devotees, and blurbs from Melissa Bank and Haven Kimmel should help attract it.
