Review: The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman
SYNOPSIS:
The only child of a single mother, Nina has her life just as she wants it: a job in a bookstore, a kick-butt trivia team, a world-class planner and a cat named Phil. If she sometimes suspects there might be more to life than reading, she just shrugs and picks up a new book.
When the father Nina never knew existed suddenly dies, leaving behind innumerable sisters, brothers, nieces, and nephews, Nina is horrified. They all live close by! They’re all—or mostly all—excited to meet her! She’ll have to Speak. To. Strangers. It’s a disaster! And as if that wasn’t enough, Tom, her trivia nemesis, has turned out to be cute, funny, and deeply interested in getting to know her. Doesn’t he realize what a terrible idea that is?
Nina considers her options.
1. Completely change her name and appearance. (Too drastic, plus she likes her hair.)
2. Flee to a deserted island. (Hard pass, see: coffee).
3. Hide in a corner of her apartment and rock back and forth. (Already doing it.)
It’s time for Nina to come out of her comfortable shell, but she isn’t convinced real life could ever live up to fiction. It’s going to take a brand-new family, a persistent suitor, and the combined effects of ice cream and trivia to make her turn her own fresh page.
REVIEW:
A whimsical read about balancing anxiety, life, and all the complicated faucets that come along with growing up. This book was a refreshing palate cleanse, with a unique voice that made me slowly read and enjoy the story. Nina is quirky, obsessive, and likes to stay within the confines of a routine. Until life is turned upside down for her and she has to decide whether to sink or swim.
I loved how realistic Nina’s emotions were. Abbi Waxman accurately captures the struggles of anxiety and balances it with wit, charm, and humor. Nina finds out about her eccentric family and then everything unravels in hilarious and horrible fashion. Nina’s new-to-her family is filled with vastly different personalities, some horrid and others exactly like Nina’s own, which had me grinning and cringing from one page to the next.
Then there is Nina’s love life, which is non-existent…mostly thanks to her obsession with planning and not being able to deter from the routine/schedule. But I loved Tom’s persistence, the chance encounters, and weird coincidences, which had me smiling and blushing.
But there was one problem I had with the story and that was Nina herself. Something about the main character and her voice had me struggling to connect with her. This disconnection had me reading as an outsider the whole story instead of being immersed in the world and feeling like I was there with the characters. I want to be sucked into the story and I can’t place my finger exactly on why I wasn’t. I think its a mix of Abbi’s writing style and Nina herself. This took away from the story for me, but I think I would read more of Abbi’s work down the road.
LINKS:
Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
