This Charming Man

Nope, nothing to do with Ralf, although he has his moments.

It's a book by Marian Keyes. Although Ralf did ask if it was about him when he saw the title and I told him it was more about how incredibly charming German men are in general, which wasn't exactly true but I think he bought it.

Yesterday I may have given the impression that I don't like chick books but actually, I enjoy a good beach read as much as the next person. In fact, I'm reading one right now.

I started This Charming Man by Marian Keyes yesterday and so far it seems to be following the same old, 'I have no self-control and systematically screw up my own life until I marry a millionaire' formula of books I generally dislike BUT this book is a cut above the others.

For one thing, the heroine is going through a bad phase that isn't 100% her own fault. I mean, her boyfriend is marrying someone else and she's bummed, it could happen to anyone. For another, Marian's heroines don't usually get a totally over the top and completely undeserved happy ending, which always makes me feel like I just wasted two hours.

Also, these points notwithstanding, Marian Keyes can really write. The passages where the heroine Lola chats with the kindly Muslim waiter Ibrihim and secretly worries that he's thinking 'Whore of the Infidel' about her while taking her order are hilarious.

Best of all, she's Irish, so I'm picking up all sorts of useful phrases like 'fizzog' and 'minger,' and 'great feed of beer.'

So if my next posts are all, 'minger this' and 'minger that' and 'shut your fizzog,' that's why.

P.S. I don't think it's her best book but so far I have no plans to publicly trash it unless, say, our Lola ends up marrying Bono after blowing up Charing Cross station in a freak accident that everyone forgives her for because she's so inexplicably lovable.

That would vex me.