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Unravelled

by Robyn Harding

You know what you’re going to get with most chick lit: an appealing heroine with a job that leads to hijinks or, at the very least, some low-grade titillation. While these books add little to no fibre to your literary diet, they’re a harmless snack while you’re on a break from more substantial fare.

Such are the components of Unravelled – minus the smut, I’m sorry to say. Our heroine, Beth, plays to type: she’s sloppy around the house, loves wine, has a quirky gig in media, and employs an equally quirky group of gals and gays as her urban family. The twist is her knitting hobby, which she grudgingly picks up after leaving her commitment-phobic boyfriend. “Aren’t we about forty years too young to be in a knitting circle?” she quips, before hauling over to a friend’s house to cast on.

Unfortunately, Harding’s storytelling is so utterly lacking in personality that she makes Candace Bushnell look like Dickens. Swaths of whiny dialogue break only for stage directions (“I sipped my wine. She looked at me”). Similarly, Beth’s narration often takes the form of a bulleted list, particularly when facing a difficult decision, requiring us all to trudge through the pros and cons. And Beth agonizes over her deathly dull boyfriend, whose sparkling eyes and “shocking” secret (spoiler: he’s not who she thinks he is!) do nothing to make him more interesting. Beth and her man never even do the deed – not surprising, in retrospect, because she has as much vavoom as a Chevy on blocks.

With so much else in this vein out there, you can afford to seek out something tastier.

 

Reviewer: Katy Pedersen

Publisher: Penguin Canada

DETAILS

Price: $19

Page Count: 352 pp

Format: Paper

ISBN: 978-0-14-305374-3

Released: June

Issue Date: 2007-6

Categories: Fiction: Novels