Otherwise Engaged: A Novel

Otherwise Engaged: A Novel
by Suzanne Finnamore

Otherwise Engaged: A Novel
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Book Summary Information

Author: Suzanne Finnamore
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2000-05-09
ISBN: 0375706429
Number of pages: 224
Publisher: Vintage

Book Reviews of Otherwise Engaged: A Novel

Book Review: A very pleasant surprise...
Summary: 5 Stars

I didn't expect to like this book as much as I did. In fact, when I saw it on my bookshelf I couldn't even remember why I bought it. Imagine my surprise to find a witty, honest account of a woman's experience with engagement, relationships and life.

The story is told in the first person by a woman in her late thirties who has given her boyfriend an ultimatum, which he accepts. As she moves toward marriage, she encounters many ups and downs and emotional obstacles, all of which are related in a straight forward manner, easy to believe and relate to. This is not a book about a woman who simply has to get married; she really cares about her intended, even panics at the thought of life without him. Yet she still experiences doubts and jitters, a clear illustration of the effect that marriage can have of even the strongest relationships.

I highly recommend Otherwise Engaged to anyone, married, single, engaged or not. There's a lot in it that everybody can relate to, whether her fear of commitment or of being found out, proven to be the 'phony' she feels she is. And all of this is presented in a funny, smart and engaging (no pun intended) way. It's certainly good for a laugh, but I was very pleasantly suprised to find out how much more there is to it. Enjoy!

Summary of Otherwise Engaged: A Novel

Otherwise Engaged is Suzanne Finnamore's wickedly funny account of an intelligent, rational woman's transformation into the harpy of anxieties that is the bride-to-be.

When Michael pops the question, Eve is deliriously happy. She tells grocery clerks. She subscribes to bridal magazines. She delights in the rainbows that shower from the one-carat (okay, .81-carat) ring on her hand. For two days. As the cumulative stresses of ordering invitations, finding a dress, and organizing the Perfect Honeymoon fry Eve's nerves, the very real prospect of being with one man for the rest of her days reverberates through her consciousness like a Chinese gong. Suddenly the sight of Michael's discarded socks on the floor and his passing mentions of his former live-in French girlfriend incite doubt, argument, and public fainting.

Uproarious, insightful, tender, Otherwise Engaged dashes our soap-bubble fantasies in favor of a hilariously realistic walk to the alter.
After 18 months of dating, hemming, hawing, begging, badgering, and threatening--as well as performing "really sincere fellatio"--the heroine of Otherwise Engaged has finally finagled an engagement ring. Eve seems confident that Michael, "the epitome of a Nice Jewish Man," is the person she wants to spend her life with. Yet she nearly kills herself soon after the celebratory dinner, staring at her newly acquired rock while speeding along a San Francisco freeway. And she may kill Michael, too, but not accidentally: "Michael leaves his socks on the floor when he takes off his shoes after work. This used to be fine. But now a sock on the floor isn't just a sock on the floor. It's a sock on the floor for the rest of my life."

Suzanne Finnamore's comic novel chronicles the happy couple's year-long engagement--which, to judge from Eve's Valium intake, is about 11 months too long. Eve and Michael bicker over every last detail: whether to hire a professional photographer or one of Michael's advertising-director buddies; which one of them wastes more money; who used up the last can of chicken stock and didn't add it to the shopping list. At 36, Eve throws more tantrums than the average toddler, and Michael's moodiness and problems with his ex-wife certainly don't help. The result is one drama-queen dilemma after another, none of them much ameliorated by Eve's slapstick sessions with "a seventy-year-old Marin County prominent Jungian."

Eve's troubles are primarily self-induced, of course, and the lush life she leads as a lavishly compensated advertising copywriter makes it hard to regard her as a tragic figure. Still, Otherwise Engaged is worth a quick read by any anxious bride-to-be who's delaying that inevitable appointment with Martha Stewart's premarital to-do checklist. --Erica Jorgensen

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