Attachments by Rainbow Rowell

Attachments is told in a series of emails alternating with prose.  I liked the way Reginald Hill included emails in The Price of Butcher's Meat, and I always like epistolary novels.  Letters are so rare now, however, that emails and texts have become the modern replacement.  The novel is an ARC from Dutton Publicity and Marketing--thanks to Katherine Burns for sending me this one!

Lincoln, shy and reclusive, is paid to read flagged emails at the Courier; Beth and Jennifer are friends and coworkers at the paper whose emails are often flagged.  Without ever having met them, Lincoln is captivated by Beth and Jennifer's exchanges.  Instead of turning them in, he finds himself looking forward to their witty repartee.


Although he has never even seen Beth, Lincoln begins falling for her.  The two friends are funny, literate, and kind, and Lincoln looks forward the flagged emails with more enthusiasm than he musters for much of anything else. Beth and Jennifer are modern young women, but not insipid, not shallow.  No, they bound off the page. They are smart and well-read, and their back-and-forth banter kept a smile on my face as I read.

Lincoln, a bit of a computer nerd, has spent years getting over his first romance, and now that he really likes someone (sight unseen), he is trapped by the fact that he has been reading the emails, peering into Beth's private life and thoughts.  What to do?

I loved these characters.  The novel is light-hearted fare, but books that keep you smiling are worth their weight in gold.  Attachments isn't deep or unpredictable.  You are pretty sure things will work out for the best, but because these are people you'd love to have as friends, you just enjoy the ride.

The novel is fresh and funny and upbeat--even as all three characters face their individual difficulties.  If you are looking for a book to make you smile, try it! 

Attachments Website....

Fiction.  Light Romance/Humor.  2011.  323 pages.