Love or Something Like It
A Novel
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4.0 • 1 Rating
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
A clear-eyed, emotionally honest debut about a thirtysomething woman forced to redefine her entire world after her young marriage falters, Love or Something Like It proves we can grow up at any age.
When Lacey Brennan meets Toby, a sweet and talented comedian, she impulsively moves across the country to be with him in Los Angeles. Lacey is unsure of what she is looking for out west–love? a new career? an escape from her fractured family?–but is reassured when Toby proposes on her thirtieth birthday. “I was thirty and I finally knew what I was doing,” she says.
In California, which Lacey calls “the edge of the earth,” she has the giddy, anticipatory feeling that anything can happen–opportunity looms large, and her life may yet turn out the way she wants it to. But soon in her marriage with Toby, from their awkward honeymoon in Paris to their desperate attempts to build careers, Lacey knows that something is wrong. Toby, unemployed, becomes a permanent fixture on the couch, and things are no better at Lacey’s TV job, where a pit bull stalks her, colleagues tyrannize her, and her boss hits on her. Meanwhile, her twin brother has dropped off the face of the earth, and Lacey begins to wonder whether she and Toby should start a family if she can’t even figure out her own. It is only after Lacey has given up on both L.A. and love that she gets an unexpected shot at happiness.
Rich with wry humor and wisdom, Deirdre Shaw’s novel deftly portrays a relatable, unforgettable character in Lacey Brennan, who, after a five-year quest for love and belonging, finds she must live in the moment in order to understand her past and face her future.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Shaw's bright and promising first novel, love lures Lacey Brennan from New York to Hollywood, where she and Toby, a TV writer, shack up in a Laurel Canyon cottage. When he proposes, 30-year-old Lacey sees the happily-ever-after she's sought since her parents' divorce, but she's vexed at every turn: the absence of her brother casts a pall over the wedding; the honeymoon is marred by arguments and stomach ailments. Professional life is no rosier: after her editor spikes her tax-evasion expos , Lacey quits her newspaper job and takes an assistant gig at a lame sitcom. Toby loses his job and wonders aloud, "Maybe I was too young to get married." First comes marriage counseling, then divorce, after which Lacey coasts into an affair with her egomaniac boss, takes a stab at screenplay writing and tries to unite her family. Only after deciding to move back to Manhattan and adopting a "spring break" attitude toward L.A. does she feel something like satisfaction. Shaw's first novel unfolds easily, with well-crafted prose and vivid detail, and even if some of the interpersonal drama can feel TV-thin, this is a great young-in-L.A. novel.
