Product Description

The new romantic comedy from No. 1 bestseller Mike Gayle

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #10331 in Books
• Published on: 2002-08-15
• Binding: Paperback
• 384 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Dinner for Two, the fourth novel from Mike Gayle, is, like its predecessors, a "blokes can be sensitive too" gander at the complicated lives of late twenty/thirtysomething Londoners. Dave Harding is a "serious music" journalist for Louder magazine, a publication "staffed by pro-faced boys who think that the more obscure the band is the cooler they are". When Louder folds Dave finds himself penning articles for Femme, a women's glossy edited by his beloved wife, Izzy, and then lands a job as the agony uncle of Teen Scene, a boy-band saturated magazine for adolescent girls. (Gayle was himself a jobbing journalist and agony uncle and in the interest of realism (or economy) re-purposes some of his own pieces for Cosmo etc. here.)

"Love Doctor" Dave finds, to his immense surprise, he rather enjoys his new career, soon he's dispensing romantic advice to correspondents, friends and colleagues with gay abandon. Since Izzy's recent miscarriage however, Dave has been obsessed with one thing: babies. At 31, he wants, more than anything else, to become a father, that is until he receives an astonishing letter from Nicola, a 13-year-old Teen Scene reader. Nicola claims that Dave is her Dad. After a few clandestine meetings in McDonalds and Burger Kings he's convinced but should he tell Izzy anything? True to his gender he dithers with predictably catastrophic, well, to be completely honest, mildly (and only briefly) unfortunate results.--Travis Elborough

Daily Mail on TURNING THIRTY
'A warm, funny romantic comedy'

Independent on Sunday on MY LEGENDARY GIRLFRIEND
'Full of belly-laughs and painfully acute observations'

Customer Reviews

Gayle is a brilliant novelist as justified by reading "Dinner for Two"
"Dinner for Two" proves Mike Gayle brilliance as a novelist. The comment can be fairly and righteously claimed on the basis on a few novels I read in recent months. "Dinner for Two" shines like gold. Literally, this mean that the novel reviewed is the finest piece of prose written by the author compared to previous literature pieces.

The novel though is noticeably based on the author's personal experience. The character in question works in freelance journalism in various magazines and as an agony uncle and his wife works for a prestigious women magazine. The novel follows the life of this couple aged in their thirties. A happily marriage couple with stable job and a modern flat, but unexpected past event threatens to ruin everything and life struggles to be the way used to be. That is the general gist of the story.

"Dinner for Two" consists of a well structured plot and credible characters, to really entice you to the novel. The theme is similar to previous novel written by Gayle, but embarks on a new perspective. That adds originality and diversity in a novel, rather than exhaust readers. Mike Gayle novels are a real delight to read, due to it light nature and its tackling of life in a modern society. Dinner for Two is Gayle finest literacy piece about adulthood.

Great read
An easy to read very entertaining book. Its warm, funny romantic and sad, a great holiday book. This is my first Mike Gayle novel and I will certainly read his others.

Excellent
As soon as I read the first page of this book I was enthralled and I couldn't wait to read another chapter, so much so that my sleep pattern was interuppted, as I generally read just before going to bed, but found I had to read another and another chapter. The author's words are so down to earth and you can relate to the characters. It has been a while since I read a good book and this is truly exceptional. I would take great delight in reading this book, again and again. Please add this to your collection, the storyline is not a Jackie Collins or a Danielle Steele, but is very unique, this book will have you laughing, crying and smiling. Mike Gayle is a very modern author - that you can easily read and truly enjoy.