Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine (2017)

Fantastic read! I am so glad I got this as an audio book because the narrator was fantastic and really nailed the characters voices. I loved the Scottish accent. Definitely a character driven story line and my opinion of the main character was constantly changing. The pacing was absolutely perfect and by the end I couldn't stop listening because I was ravenous for the conclusion. At no point was I bored, at no point do I contemplate not reading all the way through. I would happily recommend this to anyone and eagerly look forward to more novels by this author. ( )

Excellent character study ( )

I didn't like the book as much at the beginning, but I really enjoyed the last third of the book that changed my opinion. At the beginning, you are peering into the life of Eleanor, eccentric, recluse, socially awkward and she seems to drifting through life without purpose or emotion. Then, the encounter with Raymond and the friendship between Raymond and Eleanor led us look into a deeply traumatized survivor trying to cocoon herself against all potential harm and get on with life. It let me to think that there maybe difficult background to difficult person that we need to take an empathy approach. ( )

What a terrific book! It is a reason that I join in F2F book club reads, as it is modern fiction, well-written, and leads to so many interesting discussions. The premise is that of young-ish Eleanor Oliphant who has a very measured and predictable life; her habits are almost obsessive-compulsive. Almost. The bottles of vodka every weekend point to a different sort of compulsion.

Add to Eleanor's life an IT geek from her office who smokes and wears athletic shores instead of a tie, an elderly man who falls near them, mutual families who are welcoming or abusive, and you have a story that operates on a number of different levels. I started it one night and finished it a couple of nights later in time for book club night. ( )

(Audiobook) Emotionally obvious and cartoony, but not without enjoyable moments. I generally like budding friendship stories, and the pace with which this one comes to fruition is very natural and well-done. Eleanor's tragic backstory and the kind of abuse she's experienced struck me as a bit over-the-top unfortunately. Given the sensitivity of the topic and the slice-of-life natural style the book's going for, the approach to her trauma needed to walk a very fine line and I don't think it succeeded. So much of her Drax-like lack of social awareness is played for laughs, since it stretches belief at times how obtuse she can be for someone who seems as perceptive as she is, but I suppose at the same time you could say this is all perfectly explained behavior. But that level of comedy didn't mix well with the darker trauma element of the story for me. Some lingering positives: I liked that the main friendship remained platonic (though Raymond wasn't given much to do beyond sort of have a girlfriend to remind the reader that he's "taken"), and some of Eleanor's unintentional jokes about social practices were amusing. The friendship makes up one half of the book, and her relationship to her mother makes up the other. And while I enjoyed the friendship half, the lack of conflict or genuine life to the relationship beyond superficial niceties made the relationship feel pretty lacking. This became doubly grating with Gail Honeyman's Scottish narration, which is mostly good, but after a while I found her tone and performance too repetitive for the more emotionally charged scenes. A fine read, but not wholly rewarding on both storylines. ( )