Title: Surprise Me
Author: Sophie Kinsella
Series: n/a
heartfelt but unimpressive
I would like to thank Sophie Kinsella, The Dial Press/Penguin Random House, and NetGalley for allowing me to read an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
After speaking with their doctor, Sylvie and Dan Winter are daunted by the prospect of sixty-eight more years of marriage. Realizing they know each other too well, Sylvie starts Project Surprise Me in an effort to keep them interested in one another. Most of their surprises go awry, though, and lead to unintentional surprises—like long-kept secrets with the power to shatter the bubble of ignorance in which they’ve been functioning. What starts as an effort to save their marriage…might actually destroy it.
This book wasn’t a disaster, I enjoyed it, but it wasn’t Kinsella’s best work.
There were two plots. The first, which I’ll call Project Surprise Me, had a light tone and themes of living in the moment and loving completely. It was instigated and propped up by an absurdly thoughtless and unprofessional claim made by their doctor. I think Sylvie and Dan took it way too seriously and lent it more credence than it deserved. It was a flimsy foundation for a plot that fizzled out in the end. The second plot, which I’ll dub Protect Sylvie, was darker and dealt with pride, disillusionment, and the depths of grief. The two were incorporated well but not seamlessly. Project Surprise Me eventually got lost in Protect Sylvie.
I could predict the direction the story was going in, but I couldn’t predict the details. The pace was a touch slow in the middle, and I believe some elements were unnecessary and could have been removed—for example, Mary ultimately served no purpose—but then this relatively short book would have been even shorter, and short books aren’t as lucrative.
The characters were okay, but I didn’t fall in love with any of them. I sympathized with Sylvie somewhat, but I think that was more a product of the first-person narrative than any emotional connection I had with her. Other than blonde hair, we didn’t have much in common, so it was difficult to relate. Also, Sylvie’s fear of heights was one of the unnecessary elements. I very much did not appreciate the demonstration of her courage at the end, because it killed the momentum of their reunion, which was more important than her irrelevant fear of heights.
Dan was nice, but his personal goals and motivations, other than to protect Sylvie from the truth because he thought it would break her, were enigmatic, and I didn’t fully understand him as a character. I still have questions. Was his work situation resolved? He was going to do some major expansions, but I’m not sure if he did or not. And I’m not sure why he felt the need to in the first place. To compete with Sylvia’s dad in wealth? He never felt the need before, so why did he suddenly want to compete? I’m not sure what changed.
And why, exactly, did he invite his old mates over for a sudden, random dinner party? We’re led to believe it was so he could see Mary again and start an affair with her, but we learn that was unfounded, so why did Kinsella bother to include it? Did Dan think catching up with his past would make him feel less stressed about his present? That’s a bit hypocritical, since he was always telling Sylvie to stop dwelling on the past. I think it was said that he “downloaded” on Mary—or at least he halfway wanted to, but never actually did, since Mary didn’t know jack squat. As a result, her only purpose was to torture Sylvie, and that wasn’t necessary, because Sylvie already suspected something fishy was going on behind her back.
I gotta say though, Mary handled the entire situation with eerie aplomb. Imagine a guy you dated over ten years ago suddenly tracked you down and, in the capacity of friendship, wanted to vent his problems to you. Wouldn’t that be at least a little weird? Not for Mary; she acted like it was just another Tuesday.
As for the other characters, Mummy was a psycho who thrived on denial. Mrs. Kendrick was a willfully ignorant woman whose tastes included everything old-fashioned and antifeminist. However, she was willing, even determined, to learn and modernize, which endeared me to her. The twins were just there, and Prof. Russell and Owen were unnecessary (though I liked them a lot). I liked Tilda, but Toby was useless. And lastly, I was pleasantly surprised when Robert’s attitude changed for the better.
But despite its flaws, Surprise Me is filled with heart and good intention. It contains a great message about marriage, love, and realistic expectations. Mechanically, the writing was skilled, and stylistically, it was classic Kinsella, with charming awkwardness and amusing inner dialogue tangents and fabrication. I eagerly await Kinsella’s next book.
