I’ve Got Your Number

I love Sophie Kinsella. Love her. She is one of those authors that I obsessively collect everything she has ever written. I was beyond excited when I heard that she had a new standalone novel coming out, I’ve Got Your Number.

I love the Shopaholic books (the latest one Mini Shopaholic was excellent) but I adore her standalone novels. Can You Keep A Secret? was definitely my favourite but I also have a soft spot for The Undomestic Goddess and Twenties Girl was delightfully unexpected.

(Have I mentioned that I Love Sophie Kinsella? Just wanted to get that in there at least one time)

Ladies, I’ve Got Your Number did not disappoint. I obsessively read it into the wee hours this morning because I needed to finish the last 100 pages.

So Poppy Wyatt has this incredible family heirloom engagement ring – a beautiful emerald with diamond baguettes. And she is out at this fancy hotel lunch with her favourite ladies when she loses it. And in the middle of trying to sort out the confusion (did I mention the fire alarm went off right after?) her cell phone gets stolen right out of her hand.

Now she’s ringless and phoneless. Classic Kinsella heart palpitations ensue. By some incredible chance she finds a cell phone in a garbage bin in the hotel. She needs a phone to deal with the fallout of the lost engagement ring so she decides to ‘borrow’ the phone. Only thing is this phone belongs to Sam Roxton’s PA. His PA who has just walked out on the job in favour of a modeling gig. She needs the phone, he needs the messages that come through the phone. So they compromise: she will get to hang onto the phone for now, if she forwards all the communications meant for Sam.

Clearly this has hilarious implications. Sam Roxton is in the mold of Luke Brandon, for those of you familiar with the Shopaholic books. But Sam is slightly less stern. He sounds hot. All of a sudden Poppy is getting all of these insanely personal messages, highly sensitive confidential corporate material and putting her own spin on things to be helpful.

This book was classic Kinsella. There were some seriously cringe-worthy moments, some ridiculous moments that only a Sophie Kinsella heroine would find herself in and a healthy dose of sigh-producing romance. And you know, backstabby frenemies too. Gotta have frenemies.

Anyway, I’ve Got Your Number was delightful. I kind of want to read it again immediately. It also had a note on the font in the back and I LOVE that. So points all around.

The other day I came across this article that sounded like it was about Sophie Kinsella and how chick lit is awesome, but really it wasn’t. It was more about questioning if chick lit doesn’t do more harm than good.

For some reason, the idea of chick lit is deeply abhorrent to a lot of people. Something about it dumbing women down, making women seem ditzy and scatterbrained, and reinforcing the notion of women as the weaker sex? Something. I don’t know. I personally have never understood the uproar.

I am a self confessed, unabashed lover (and promoter) of chick lit.

In my personal opinion, Sophie Kinsella and Marian Keyes are the complete and total Queens of the genre, dominating my own bookshelves for years now. But there is room for the likes of the equally impressive Emily Giffin, Jane Green and Cecelia Ahern (whose work *confession* I have not read as yet only because I’m terrified of crying (see: sobbing) like a baby, having seenP.S. I Love You completely against my will).

I think the argument against chick lit has a lot to do with the perceived materialism exhibited by the female characters in these books and maybe these days, with a pinch of hindsight, that makes folks uncomfortable. But just like I continue to buy Vogue magazine, chock full of all the beautiful things that I will never be able to have, I love to jump into the Shopaholic books and read about all the beautiful things that Becky Bloomwood finds. If I can’t have them, someone should be able to! Even if that someone is a fictional (albeit it fabulous) character.

I like to think of myself as a smart woman. I’m fairly well read. I know stuff. So what’s the problem with reading chick lit? It’s fun, often extremely poignant and there is always something to be gleaned from them about the human condition. And isn’t an emotional education just as important as a formal one?

By attempting to diminish the work of these brilliant women, the people that have an issue with the chick lit genre are belittling their merit and insulting those of us that love their work. When I finish Catherine the Great, I would love nothing more than to have something chick lit-ish waiting for me next. And I see nothing wrong with that.

Bottom line here: I’m going to read what makes me happy, so if you know what’s good for you, you will stop harping on about all this chick lit stuff and let me read it in peace!

Sophie Kinsella’s new one (I’ve Got Your Number) was released this week. I’ve visited copies of it a few times now. Haven’t taken the plunge. Soon my pretty!