The Undomestic Goddess

I was a little worried going into this, having seen reviews suggesting it closely mirrored the plot of The Burnout, but I was pleased to find it felt quite different, largely thanks to Samantha’s characterisation. The story follows a high flying lawyer who accidentally ends up working as a housekeeper for a couple in a village in Gloucestershire. It is light and full of silly moments, but also has some quietly astute and heart warming observations.

Samantha is smart, hard working, a little ridiculous, but very much someone whose heart is in the right place. The book leans into tropes and light stereotypes, but never takes itself too seriously. If you meet it in that spirit, it becomes a refreshing break, the kind that gently reminds show more you there is a world outside the rat race.

The dynamic between Samantha and Nathaniel works particularly well. He recognises early on that she is not quite what she claims to be, and that shapes their relationship in a way that feels more grounded than expected. The introduction to his mother is a lovely moment, and his response to the eventual reveal avoids the usual turn into hurt feelings. Instead, it becomes something more steady, an exploration of trust that sits alongside the more tangible pressure of Samantha’s job.

The contrast between Samantha’s relationship with her real family and her found family feels fitting for her character, and lands as a genuine source of warmth. Freya’s brief appearance stood out as well, and I found myself wishing for more of her, she feels like she could easily carry a story of her own.

Overall, this is a gentle step out of the day to day, with a slightly idealised promise that anyone might learn to clean, or even find joy in cooking. It works best if you are open to that shift in perspective. If you are firmly in a work driven mindset, it may not quite meet you where you are. show less

It’s not as if there is anything unpredictable in Kinsella’s books, but they are nevertheless full of humor and charm, and worth reading in spite of the lack of significant surprise.

I loved the premise of this book: a high-powered London lawyer, 29-year-old Samantha Sweeting, running from a horrible mistake at work, stops at a house in the Cotswolds for a glass of water, and gets mistaken for an applicant for a domestic servant. Before she knows it, she has taken the job. She can’t cook or clean; she has always used hired help herself. The handsome (of course) gardener Nathaniel notices her plight, and offers to have his mother Iris help Samantha. Iris (of course) just happens to have learned to cook in Italy, and is fantastic at show more it.

Samantha doesn’t just need training in cooking and cleaning; even relaxation is not natural to her. She comes from a family for whom a typical Christmas is her barrister mom reading a court report, and her head-of-investment brother taking a Xanax while he checked financial indexes. (She has another brother, but he had a nervous breakdown.) For Samantha, time has always been divided into six-minute intervals (corresponding to how law firms bill clients), and working all hours of every day and every night just seems natural. Iris and Nathaniel aim to teach her otherwise.

Samantha’s new employers, the Geigers, are very funny and very endearing, if a bit benighted. But they are far preferable to her previous employers. In fact, she finds out just how much when she inadvertently discovers the real nature of her “mistake” at the law firm.

Evaluation: This book by Kinsella is delightful. Although the story arcs in her books are similar to one another, she adds so much hilarity that it is a joy to read her books anyway. They are just the thing when you are looking for a light sorbet between your heavier main course books. show less

The Undomestic Goddess is an all around laugh out loud, feel good read for those who need a little “pick me up” and a quick reminder that even when life goes left, it may still be going right.

Samantha has finally reached the culminating moment in her life – being named a partner at one of London’s top law firms. Every decision and sacrifice she has made: The late nights, the lack of a life, the inability to go more than 30 seconds without her phone and blackberry, all of it was finally going to pay off…until the unthinkable happens. Awaiting the “official” announcement, Samantha finds the one thing that will destroy her career. Seeing no way out of her life altering mistake, Samantha escapes the restraints of the big city show more and ends up in the middle of nowhere! Making one bad decision after the next, the once high powered lawyer finds herself impersonating a highly trained housekeeper and chef! With zero skills in cooking or cleaning, the laughs start rolling in as Samantha’s conning and quick mind keeps her one step ahead of her quirky new employers (not to mention having Nathaniel, the gardener, come to her rescue with a secret weapon). As an initial overnight stay turns into days and weeks, Samantha finds herself re-evaluating her life and wonders if everything she once wanted was everything she really needed.

Charming, funny, and surprising steamy (on the milder side) for Kinsella book, The Undomestic Goddess is a relaxing read with a little social commentary on the role of women. It was entertaining and enlightening to watch Samantha’s perspective of women and their roles shift as her own life was transformed. show less

Library Audiobook:

I have to say, this started off on a wrong note for me. I’m going to blame the narrator even though there is a comedy of errors that was way over the top. But then! This book picked up & turned into a gem. The main protagonist ends up as a housekeeper to an unusual couple in the English countryside.

She gets into all sorts of shenanigans as she’s never cleaned or cooked. There is a romance and she has to come to a decision as to where she wants her life to go. Very good.

I'm not going to say too much about this... but I read it at the perfect time... about a month after leaving my busy-all-the-time, perma-attached-to-phone, high-stress law job for a wonderful job working for the courts.

This was my first Kinsella, and I will definitely read more! She's funny and at times poignant and flippant and thoughtful and easy. Although of *course* not everything in the book is realistic, including sort of one of the underlying premises (it is a *fiction* after all), but Kinsella does a good job of capturing the essence of both perspectives.

What was most impressive to me was that I noticed that my pace of reading the book matched the pace of what was happening in the book.. i.e., it was a little frenetic at the show more start and again at the end, but slowed down to enjoy the roses in between. I think this is a mark of a good story teller - the ability to control your reader's flow.

Definitely recommend to ANY female lawyers (and probably a fair few male lawyers as well), or anyone who has a lot of job-related stress or used to have a lot of job-related stress, or anyone who just wants to be entertained. A super quick read, and fun to boot. show less

These books are so awful. They're like the cellophane bags of candy at the quick store just off the highway -- long road trip, you stagger out of the car, I need some jerky, where's the toilet. Three bags of chewy sugar for ten dollars and you make a face but hand over the money because you're in the exact middle of Who Gives A Shit, Pennsylvania and there are no other options and you need a hell of a lot of Comfortable Distraction to get through the next sixteen hours of road.

Like that.

I didn’t love Confessions of a Shopaholic, but I wasn’t turned off of Kinsella as a author. The Undomestic Goddess sounded like a fun read and it was.

I enjoyed Samantha Sweeting so much more than Becky Bloomwood, but that’s just me.

It’s the same basic chick lit plot, but I think where I was pulled in is when Samantha runs away and starts living. I know when things seem to be melting down all around me that’s what I want to do. Of course, there’s the classic “Am I going to get caught?” and the silliness of Sam not knowing how to use a washing machine (does she get her underwear dry cleaned too?), but where the realism is for me is her growth.

She grows from being so concerned with success as a lawyer and pleases everyone show more to enjoying life, making real friends, and having a moment to herself. She begins to appreciate life and living. Plus, I loved the romance aspect.

It was a fun, quick (just a few hours), and entertaining read. After this I think I’m going to give Becky Bloomwood another try…maybe the rest of the Shopaholic series will grow on me. Maybe. show less