Product Description

Meet Sophie Applebaum - as enchanting a heroine as Jane in "The Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing". Sophie is an outsider and an inventor of rules, simply because she does not fit into any neat description of who she might be: she's Jewish, but lacks religious feeling; a book-lover, but a mediocre student; a loyal friend often unpleasantly surprised; and a less-than-devoted employee. She falls in love precipitously, but isn't sure whom she should marry - or if she wants to marry at all despite all the family pressures and social clamour on this subject. We follow the life cycle of her family, and we follow her to school, through college, to her first job with terrible typing skills, through to the realisation that work isn't fulfilment, that your parents aren't quite what you thought and that Mr. Right is sometimes only all right...Readers who loved "The Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing" won't be disappointed; this is a sparkling, heartfelt, deeply explorative book characterized, as always, by Melissa Bank's light touch, signature humour, and her vast talent for capturing a moment, taking it to heart, and giving it back to her readers.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #490707 in Books
• Published on: 2006-06-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

From the Back Cover
'A lovely, funny, melancholy stroll through twenty years of a woman's life and when I'd finished it, I wished I was getting more' Zadie Smith

'Endearingly upbeat and witty...reads like Jane Austen rescripted as Dorothy Parker' Daily Telegraph

'Brilliant observation, a glorious turn of phrase...Bank achieves something close to perfection' Guardian

'The kind of girl you'd want to have as your best friend...so brilliantly written you'll want to ration it out, so you never reach the end' Marie Claire

About the Author
Melissa Bank's first book, The Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing, was published by Viking in 1999. She lives in New York City

Customer Reviews

Thanks, Ms Bank
Melissa Bank writes touchingly, beautifully and - most of all - wittily. How could anyone not love the author of words such as: "These meetings always made me feel that the clocks had stopped and all beauty had gone from the world"? Her book would be worth reading for such sparkling nuggets alone. But there is much more to it than that: her style is impeccable, her characters three-dimensional and delicately observed, and Sophie Applebaum's wanderings through the world of potential husbands gently grip the reader's attention. My only criticism is that the book seems less like a novel than a series of short stories, hastily strung together, and even more hastily brought to a shuddering and very unsatisfactory halt with the last chapter (oh yes, that and the weird title ...). Nevertheless, this is great writing and does not deserve to be linked in any way with the chick lit genre. Thanks, Ms Bank.

give me the next 20 years
this wonderful novel gave me a warm feeling all over! I just finished it on holiday and so had the benfit of reading it all almost in one go which always is a bonus. Sophie is such a well drawn character, her constant asides to the reader really struck a chord with me each time she made them, and they made me laugh outloud. I don't often feel moved to contact an author after I have finished reading a novel but in this case I wanted to send a mail immediately to Melissa Bank and tell her how much ejoyment she had afforded me. The story is excellent but for me its all about characterisation and this cast all felt completely real to me. Take a chance, buy it and you'll not be sorry.

Bank deepens and broadens her range
Melissa Bank's second book -- a novel, a book of linked stories-may disappoint some fans of A Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing, but as a writer she has gone far deeper in her new book, The Wonder Spot. The wit is still there, the graceful prose, the deep empathy one feels for the main character, Sophie Applebaum. But in The Wonder Spot Bank shows new depths and nuances and shadows. She doesn't hide from sadness or loneliness or failure with her lightning wit-and her canvas in The Wonder Spot is broader. She deals with death and religion; with issues of class and money; with even deeper themes of identity and appearance in conflict with character and integrity that is nearly Jamesian. She is strong and smart and funny, but she is also no longer afraid to be vulnerable. Second books-especially after huge first successes-are tough, but Melissa Bank has far exceeded even our most generous expectations. She has written an important and brilliant new book. But try it for yourself. Pick up a copy! Another book I need to recommend -- very much on my mind since I purchased a copy off Amazon is "The Losers' Club: Complete Restored Edition" by Richard Perez, a funny, highly entertaining little novel I can't stop thinking about.