Head Over Heels

I had two books last week from publishers that were at polar opposite ends of the spectrum of "gendered" literature. They both sucked.

First Blood is the novel that the movie Rambo was based and is total dick lit. Basically, a war vet with PTSD meets a cop with control issues and they spend the rest of the book trying to kill each other for no adequately explored reason. Head Over Heels on the other hand is quintessential chick lit: fluffy romance with no real conflict, just misunderstanding and miscommunication, but then everybody talks and lives happily ever after. Neither book was badly written, both had consistent pacing and both are reprints which were originally published decades ago. And my hatred for both of them is mostly show more predicated on lack of balance. There is hardly any conversation in First Blood (entire chapters pass with nobody taking to another human being!) and the majority of the characters only exist to be killed off (I was disoriented by how high the body count was). Head over Heels is all talk and no action and by the end of it I was really wishing somebody would be killed (or, even better, several people), because there are far too many characters who only exist to be a romantic interest.

In a perfect world, Rambo and Sheriff Teasdale are magically transported to Upper Sibley and blow the place to smithereens. Everybody dies, except for Teasdale and Jessie (the main protagonist from Head Over Heels whose relationship with her long-lost love was so inane I nearly puked) who fall in love and build a perfect literary world where people occasionally get killed but everybody talks about it first.

Thank you to Sourcebooks who sent me a copy of this book for review. show less

I read Ms. Mansell for the lighthearted way she tells a story. But this one was too full of people who didn't value marriage or fidelity and that got in the way of my enjoyment.

Cute beach reading. But got predictable. Some issues were quite ahead of its time including transgender and other lgbtq dilemmas. This was published 20 years ago but reads like today.

I began this novel feeling sceptical, but I really enjoyed it. An easy to read tale of life in a small English village, and all the town-gossips that come with it.

Faces the issue of prejudice, but not in any depth.

This book was okay. My biggest complaint is that there are too many characters with their own storylines. Way too much going on in this book. The author would have done better to develop the main characters a little more instead of adding so much detritus to the story.

[a:Jill Mansell|23625|Jill Mansell|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1272239183p2/23625.jpg] books are like soap operas. Lots of everyone sleeping with everyone, doubtful paternity and mistaken identities. Good thing I enjoy soaps!

I loved this book, the different character's story lines were nicely interwoven and they were all very believable. this could easily have continued on to a subsequent book charting the lives of the new couples.