"The Girl Before" or "It's all done
in the worst possible taste"
You are going to be hearing a lot about this book in the next few months
because it has been optioned as movie to be directed by Ron Howard.
And the only thing that I need to say to Ron is
"You've not actually read this have you?"
And it's OK, I can sympathise, it must be tough to find new material.
What with Reece Witherspoon snapping up every promising new novel with
the speed of the road runner on crack.
What is a bloke to do? It's
the quick or the dead and you Ron, despite the occasional internet rumors to
the contrary are clearly not dead.
However the thing is once this movie comes out a lot of female people
might be rather keen on altering your whole "living" situation.
The plot basically goes like this.
Two women, two stories, told in concert but a few months apart.
Both are recovering from traumatic events in their lives - well actually one of
them not so much, she is just a big liar. I'm not going to tell you what
she lies about because you might be stuck on a deserted island with this
festering pile of bollox as your only reading material and I would hate
to spoil the extremely distasteful "twist" for you.
Although my advice would be to use it ward off the sharks or make a fire
with instead of you know, reading it…
The suspects: are a handsome brooding architect with a thing for
ultra-minimalism and rough sex.
The grieving former boyfriend of the one of the women (oh yeah, one of
them is dead, but that isn't a spoiler since we find that out pretty
much straight away).
And a house - which gets a character billing because there are a LOT of
descriptions of the house, in some places the book reads like a real estate
marketing campaign. This is unsurprising as the author used to work in
advertising.
It's a sleek neat-freaks wet dream of a smart-wired house in the middle of
London with 200 rules for the tenants and a killer (literally)floating
staircase.
Designed by handsome brooding architect in the wake of the deaths of his
wife and child in "mysterious circumstances".
Basically, Architect rents the house out but only to specific types of
women, who are prepared to subject themselves to a spot of psychological
profiling (how very Telecom in the nineties) and agree to abide by the
aforementioned 200 rules.
Most of the rules revolve around maintaining the pristine and uncluttered
nature of the dwelling. Or as anyone who has ever co-habited with me for
an extended period refers to it, "living with Jo"
So not that arduous really, I mean who doesn't like a tidy house?
The kicker is that none of these women last for very long, because
either they are incapable of picking up their shit like normal human beings or
they die in "mysterious circumstances".
Once you have guessed who the killer is - from the extensive list of two
suspects - there isn't much left to do but marvel at writer's uncanny ability
to combine "Architectural Digest" with "Obsessive Compulsives
Monthly" into word salad.
A new genre has been unveiled, OCD erotica combined with house
porn. Now being low level OCD myself I should be totally down with that.
Lines like "he arranged my spices in alphabetical
order" Phwoar! "He took me across the uncluttered kitchen
bench" Woof!
For anyone to take me on my kitchen bench they would first have to wait
for half an hour whist I remove three months accumulated bumpf (none of it my
own I might add) and give that bench a jolly good scrub with multiple cleaning
products.
By which point I suspect that the moment of spontaneous passion would
have well passed and the poor bloke have wandered off to grab a cold one
and see what is happening on ESPN.
Also
the Architect folds his clothes BEFORE sex - I think I just la petite
mort-ed
So I am totally down with the OCD/neat freak factor. It's the
actual freak factor that is far less appealing.
Because approximately halfway through the book, out of a clear blue sky, this
line happens:
"Yes Daddy, yes!"
In a sexually violent context. Which she then goes on to describe as
"the best sex of my life"
It's cool, you can go and throw up, I'll wait right here.
Feeling better? Actually, I very much doubt that you are because
there is NOTHING that makes that sentence OK. The only possible
reaction to it being "No, oh dear God, no".
What were you thinking Tony????
Because yep, this was written by a man - I see you JP Delaney AKA Tony
Strong hiding behind your catchy EL James type pseudonym.
Perhaps you chose it because pseudo-erotica written by a bloke named
Tony would have less allure for the female audience. However at
least you had been more upfront in your naming conventions it would make it
easier for women to avoid this piece of misogynistic (and possibly even
dangerous) tripe.
Ron, mate, do yourself a favour, write pervy old Tony a "dear
Tony" letter and consider optioning this instead, because it is funny
as…well…f*ck and the writer appears to like women - despite possibly never having
had sex in his life.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Belinda-Blinked-passion-business-removing-ebook/dp/B00UO7WOAS
Get these guys http://www.mydadwroteaporno.com/ to direct and produce it for you while lie on a beach somewhere (with
plenty of Factor 50 on - because…. ginger) and contemplate
#betterliterarychoices whist reading this excellent article about what women
REALLY want:
http://www.esquire.co.uk/culture/advice/a9641/things-men-dont-know-about-women-caitlin-moran/
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