Flights

If you have any latent romantic heartstrings that can be pulled, then James Collins’ Beginners Greek is your ticket. This is the kind of story that may even inspire frequent flights cross-country. Personally I’m about ready to hop a flight to LA. And that’s not solely because I have heaps of family and friends down there I’d really like to visit.

So, the premise is that two young people fall in love. Setting: airplane. Distance: NYC to LA. Focal point: the woman is reading The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann (I still remember who I was in love with when I read that book! – and, as wonderful as second breakfast sounded, it was the rest cures that captured my imagination… and which have appeared in my lifestyle…..). Tragedy: the guy loses the girl’s phone number. Resolution: ahem, well, really, you’re literate, read it yourself.

I do, in fact, feel that it is worth reading – major caveat: unless you’re like my sister; I can’t imagine her liking it one bit, or my roommate’s boyfriend, either. It’s a little less intellectual than, say, Thomas Mann, but it isn’t trite. It moves with the intrigue of Gone With the Wind but was compared by critics to something by Jane Austen. The ‘hero’ seems a little bit too wussy and perfect to be believed – what investment banker do you know who’s able to recite an entire poem by an little-known American, who lived in Greece, at a dinner party just off the cuff, and yet not tell a girl he’s been in love with for nearly a decade that he fancies her? Perhaps I’m too judgmental. He sounds a little absurd. He sounds like someone I might know but don’t get….

At times I felt that the book could have been written by someone a bit like the character Charlotte – someone who tries so very hard. Incidentally, Charlotte felt like the absolute most authentic person, followed, but not very closely, by the heroine, Holly. The author wrote about women so well; I wonder if his mother died when he was young and now he’s just trying to earn the love of women…. A joke, once you’ve read the book you’ll get it.

The one string left hanging was the only one I saw from a fair distance the easiest resolution. In other words, one character’s presence in the story was purely to be a catalyst. Sort of the same role as the apothecary in Romeo & Juliet. Funny, her name was Julia…. I ended up respecting her a tiny bit and not minding overly much at all that it looks like she suffered a completely renewed spirit over the course of the book and would choose the right path from here on out.

The setting being New York City, with brief flights to LA, Paris, etc, was alright. I often wondered while reading why two such good people ended up there, but I shouldn’t. I know some lovely people, whose stories don’t even remotely resemble this one, living in NYC. But I’ll readily admit that finding love there and the description of the lifestyle enjoyed did not entice me. This realization surfaced into my consciousness multiple times while reading the book. Usually as a scene is created I get entirely caught up in it. This was a disconcerting break from my suspension of disbelief, and I have no ready explanation.