The Clasp by Sloane Crosley These Shallow Graves by Jennifer Donnelly Sofia Khan is Not Obliged by Ayisha Malik

Attachments by Rainbow Rowell

Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Publisher: Orion
Format: Kindle e-book
Rating: 4/5

Lincoln is working rather unsociable hours as an Internet Security Officer in the IT department of a local newspaper, where he spends evenings skimming over emails flagged for inappropiate content and subsequently sending warning letters to the culprits. Beth and Jennifer are work besties who flagrantly ignore their new internet policy, even though they know their messages are being read by someone, somewhere. After seeing their names crop up a few times, Lincoln begins to do more than skim-read when it comes to Beth's and Jennifer's emails and he's soon enthralled by the everyday goings on in their lives. Lincoln eventually realises he likes one of them more than he could ever imagine but how will she take the fact that he fell in love with her email self before he even met her? 

This was a great read. Really funny and lively and wholesome. It reminded me of the Meg Cabot books I loved, such as Boy Meets Girl. I wasn't really a fan of Eleanor + Park- I think I'm the only one out there- but I've wanted to read Attachments for a while and I'm glad I gave it a go. It was just nice to read about nice characters who weren't terribly boring. 

Beth and Jennifer's friendship was beautifully written - I can't wait to find my work BFF! I couldn't picture Beth for a while but I've been watching Rookie Blue quite a bit recently and heard Missy Peregrym's voice. Actually, I suppose it isn't too weird to not be able to picture her, considering nearly everything about Beth was revealed through her emails to Jennifer, so there wasn't the usual "I tossed my long, flowing, golden locks over my tanned, freckled shoulder and blinked my emerald green eyes repeatedly in irritation" style sentences. Having said that, from the get go I pictured Jennifer as Megan Hilty, so who knows. 

Online privacy is a buzz topic - quite rightly so - but I do wonder if this happens more often? It must be quite weird working in IT, reading the flagged emails, and then meeting the person in the lift on the way home. Then again, I guess it isn't too different from working in HR and trying to look certain people in the eye after reading certain things in their files. Awkward...Anyhoo, this could have been a really creepy, stalkerish story but Rainbow Rowell kept firmly on the right side of light and Lincoln was such sweet, likeable character that it softened the blow a little bit. 

The 1999/2000 setting was so much fun! I revelled in all the pop culture references (I loved Sally Jesse Raphael!) and the impending doom of the Millenium Bug that never turned up. Or so we think muhahahaha. Anyway, this was an altogether positiviely delightful story and I'm sure I'll read it again. I wonder if there's an audiobook version...


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