No!’ Megan tossed her shiny, blonde hair in annoyance. ‘I mean, what kind of name is “Mrs Nolan” for a psychic? She should be called Madam Zora or something like that. She can’t be called “Mrs Nolan”. How can we believe a word that she says?’ The book is about a single in London and her quest to find Mr. Right. The book starts off with a psychic's prediction that the boyfriendless Lucy is getting married in the next 18 months. Lucy doesn't believe it at first, but the psychics predictions with regards to her friends (who got their own psychic readings) started to come true. Lucy ends up meeting Gus, a complete loser, at a party. For some inexplicable reason, she is drawn to Gus' irresponsibility and drug-induced pointless chatter and dates Gus. She convinces herself that she and Gus are meant to be because of the psychic prediction and overlooks some serious character flaws. I won't spoil the story for everyone - while the ending is predictable, how she got there is not - but ultimately Lucy faces childhood demons about her father and realizes that she has a pattern to date men who have similar flaws to her father. One morning I woke up and he was propped on his elbow, staring down at me. ‘You’re beautiful,’ he murmured, and it felt so wrong.

I woke up in the middle of the night wondering about my sense of self-worth – why was I comfortable only when I was being ill-treated? What really stood out to me reading this the second time around, is that Lucy suffers from depression. I can’t say that I remember this from reading it all those years ago. Within the first few chapters, when Lucy visits the psychic, Mrs. Nolan says something that strikes a chord, and Lucy admits that ”A dark cloud, was exactly how I described the bouts of depression that I sometimes got.” And perhaps saddest of all, is the deep embarrassment Lucy feels from feeling this way. During her appearance on Desert Island Discs in March 2017, Keyes told the host that "[by] conditioning women to think that what they find empowering or valuable is worth less than what men consider to be worthwhile, women are prevented from reaching for parity and the gender gap in power and money between men and women is kept in the favour of men". [11]Marian Keyes (born 10 September 1963) is an Irish author and radio presenter. She is principally known for her popular fiction. a b Sweeting, Adam (9 November 1999). "Soap, but not as we know it". The Guardian. London . Retrieved 27 April 2008.

Jadi bayangkan saja, selama membaca buku ini saya sering berdecak-decak tak sabar dan geleng-geleng melihat 'ketololan' Lucy. Belum lagi hobi mabuknya yang bikin gemas. Bagaimana mau berpikir jernih kalau tiap hari mabuk-mabukan? (Mamah Dedeh mode on) Tapi kayaknya itu memang sudah kebiasaan di sana ya, jadi saya nggak bisa protes. Ingat saja Bridget Jones yang hobi minum (Tapi saya jauuuh lebih cinta Bridget Jones). Dan Lucy itu pemalas, di kantor kerjanya cuma gosip dan duduk-duduk sambil menunggu jam pulang. Ya wajar lah kalau karirnya mentok (satu hal lagi yang menjadi 'kesialan' Lucy) The second reason is that I was really mortified with the spineless Lucy, who seemed to be living on cloud nine. She was completely oblivious of the things happening around her. She was angry with her mother for being angry with her out-of-job, alcoholic father. In fact she absolutely refused to accept that her father was an alcoholic. I was curious to see how Keyes turned Lucy into a heroine worthy of our time. I must say that Keyes does the part of bringing Lucy down to earth in a grand fashion...almost tempting me to give 3 stars to this book.But I also like the change of pace (from a typical storyline) in that she falls in love before lust. It's such a common themes in the books I've been reading for a character to be all hot for a guy, but really hates him and has to learn to get over that or something. Maybe I'm just feeling old fashioned today, but I thought the development of her relationship with the mystery man (no spoilers here!) was beautiful to watch. And the way he treated her was just so realistically romantic to me (not the typical swooping you off to Paris or something, but giving you a ride, making you dinner, etc). Her love life is an absolute disaster - she lurches from one hopeless relationship to the next, never wanting to put any kind of pressure on her generally broke, party-loving and useless boyfriends. Eventually she begins to believe the fortune teller is right especially when she meets what she her ideal man - Gus. But Meredia never did. And in the meantime she was condemned to cause cars to swerve whenever she walked down the road. Because instead of trying to disguise her size with vertical stripes and dark colours, she seemed to dress to enhance it. She went for the layered look, layers and layers and layers of fabric. Really, lots. Acres of fabric, yards and yards of velvet, draped and pinned and knotted and tied, anchored with broaches, attached with scarves, pinned and arranged along her sizeable girth.

I also found it hard to connect with some of the characters; in particular Lucy and her love interest Gus. The main characters is Marian's books always tend to be quirky, awkward women who are really easy to relate too, but I found Lucy to be too much. Instead of being quirky it seemed like she has mental health issues. I felt the same about Gus, who we were obviously meant to find endearingly strange and unpredictable. I just found him irritating and didn't understand Lucy's interest in him. I think this will really depend on everyone's personal preferences, but there was nothing attractive to me about his personality at all. Again, this really affected my overall enjoyment. Lucy Sullivan is a typical Londoner. Twenty-six years old, she is burdened with a dysfunctional family, a dead-end job, an anal-retentive boss, a medley of demented colleagues, flat mates who totter on the thin line between heaven and hell AND a love-life that’s riddled with enough potholes to make you dizzy. There are many things happening in this book... failed romances, the psycho flatmate, the very overweight man-hungry co-worker, and of the course the delicious and perfect Daniel -Lucy's very good and kind friend.First reason is that sadly these characters are truly based on real life behavior of people around us. The bossy-friend-whom-you-can't-say-no-to, the siblings-who-don't-give-a-damn-about-your-parents and the coworkers-who-earn-the-same-as-you-but-don't-do-a-minute's-worth-work; we have all met these people at one time or another in our life. I was curious to read more about the intolerable behavior of these people. So it’s definitely not “Coral”?’ Megan took a little notebook out of her holdall and drew a line through something. a b "Haze makes way for bright future". Cambridge Evening News. Archived from the original on 17 November 2007 . Retrieved 27 April 2008. Because you’re beautiful,’ or ‘Because you’re sexy,’ or ‘Because you’re all woman,’ were the nauseating replies that he gave me. Here's the Bookclub verdict. While most of the others found the book was “light and fluffy”, it was agreed that there were darker underlying themes of addiction featured throughout. Wrapped up in humour. And that you do not understand the reality of someone’s life, unless you live it yourself, even if only for a little while. The more mature women amongst us, could see from a mile away that the charming Gus was all smoke and mirrors, and not at all the type of person to get involved with. Let alone fall in love with. Ah, the sweet folly of youth!

a b c Ingle, Róisín (9 September 2017). "Marian Keyes: 'There's an awful lot of riding in my book' ". The Irish Times . Retrieved 20 October 2017. This is one of those rare occasions where I wonder where a well liked character is today. And kinda wish the writer would revisit her story (Marian? Hallo?!). Wherever Lucy Sullivan is, I hope she is doing just fabliss. Megan was doing her grand tour of Europe and had temporarily run out of money. But as soon as she had enough money to go, she was going, she constantly reminded us, to Scandinavia, or Greece, or the Pyrenees, or the West of Ireland. Another memory I have of reading this book the first time around, is that when I started it, I could not put it down. I just had to know how things would work out for Lucy and the charming, unreliable Gus, who she’s just met. I read most of the book in one go, sitting on the kitchen floor. Why was I reading it from the kitchen floor? I really don’t know. I have a vague idea I may have been making a cuppa, and while waiting for the kettle to boil, I got engrossed in the book. And forgot about the cuppa. a b c "BBC One - imagine..., 2022, Marian Keyes: My (not so) Perfect Life". BBC . Retrieved 8 February 2022.Pokoknya, dia itu kayak nggak berjuang untuk mendapatkan hidup yang lebih baik. Saya sampai berpikir jangan-jangan penulisnya membenci tokohnya sendiri, kok nggak ada bagus-bagusnya si Lucy ini :D Ya selain cantik seperti boneka sih. Lucy and her fellow office slaves, Hetty, Meridia and Megan have a date with destiny. They’re off to have their fortunes told by an Irish psychic, a Mrs.Nolan. Who was very very good, as everyone knows ”There seemed to be a direct link between how difficult it was to get to a fortune-teller’s house and how good their reputation was. The more inaccessible and off putting the venue, the higher the quality of the predictions, was the most widely held view.” I didn’t really mind, I just assumed that those were the kind of terms you went out with a man like Steven on. Lucy Sullivan's been told she is getting married . . . but to who? Discover the uplifting, laugh-out-loud story of a reluctant wrestle with fate, from the No. 1 bestselling author of Grown Ups