I wanted to love Wilde Like Me - it sounded like a brilliant read, and Robin Wilde sounded like my kind of girl, and I loved the idea that this was going to focus on what sounded like depression (it's referred to as The Emptiness), something that's not often discussed in Chick Lit (or any fiction, really - you can't be depressed when you're in a rom-com! That's not how it works, she says sarcastically).
However, I just found Wilde Like Me to be a bit boring. Robin had a good voice, but she was also kind of repetitive. In those first 50 pages, she mentioned it was January about fifty times. I GET IT. IT'S JANUARY. IT'S DARK AND GLOOMY, ETC. THERE'S NO DAYLIGHT. STOP REMINDING ME.
I also don't subscribe to the notion that just because you're lonely/depressed, you need a man to cheer you up. I mean, what? What kind of backwards logic is that? So Robin is only lonely because she needs a fella? Are you having a laugh. It sounded, to me, that Robin was lonely because of the depression she was suffering from and perhaps needed to fix *those* issues before she decided to start dating. Or, maybe that's just me.
I also hated the ideology Robin had that because she was a single mother, that meant her daughter Lyla was suffering. *Insert massive eye roll here* There are plenty of kids who come from "broken" homes, which considering Lyla spends time with her mother and father, albeit separately, didn't seem particularly broken to me. They both seemed like stable parents, with their fair share of custody. I don't know if the guilt Robin felt, that everything she did somehow made Lyla's life worse, was another result of The Emptiness, but I found myself getting a bit annoyed about it all and if I was a single mother, reading that every few pages, that being a single mother is the worst of the worst, I'd be even more fuming. Single mothers are heroes. They do incredible jobs, especially the ones who work on top of that, so I don't like the idea of any single parent (man or woman!) bringing themselves down because they happened to split up with their partner. Being in a relationship that isn't working is surely worse than being a single parent, at least as far as the kids are concerned.
Wilde Like Me wasn't for me. Because I'm not a parent, because I don't have those experiences, books like this are always hit or miss with me. It depends on the story, the author, the writing and how receptive I am to the book itself. This one was a miss. I suspect Wilde Like Me will go down a storm with readers, I'm just a fussy reader, end of.
However, I just found Wilde Like Me to be a bit boring. Robin had a good voice, but she was also kind of repetitive. In those first 50 pages, she mentioned it was January about fifty times. I GET IT. IT'S JANUARY. IT'S DARK AND GLOOMY, ETC. THERE'S NO DAYLIGHT. STOP REMINDING ME.
I also don't subscribe to the notion that just because you're lonely/depressed, you need a man to cheer you up. I mean, what? What kind of backwards logic is that? So Robin is only lonely because she needs a fella? Are you having a laugh. It sounded, to me, that Robin was lonely because of the depression she was suffering from and perhaps needed to fix *those* issues before she decided to start dating. Or, maybe that's just me.
I also hated the ideology Robin had that because she was a single mother, that meant her daughter Lyla was suffering. *Insert massive eye roll here* There are plenty of kids who come from "broken" homes, which considering Lyla spends time with her mother and father, albeit separately, didn't seem particularly broken to me. They both seemed like stable parents, with their fair share of custody. I don't know if the guilt Robin felt, that everything she did somehow made Lyla's life worse, was another result of The Emptiness, but I found myself getting a bit annoyed about it all and if I was a single mother, reading that every few pages, that being a single mother is the worst of the worst, I'd be even more fuming. Single mothers are heroes. They do incredible jobs, especially the ones who work on top of that, so I don't like the idea of any single parent (man or woman!) bringing themselves down because they happened to split up with their partner. Being in a relationship that isn't working is surely worse than being a single parent, at least as far as the kids are concerned.
Wilde Like Me wasn't for me. Because I'm not a parent, because I don't have those experiences, books like this are always hit or miss with me. It depends on the story, the author, the writing and how receptive I am to the book itself. This one was a miss. I suspect Wilde Like Me will go down a storm with readers, I'm just a fussy reader, end of.