*Special Content only on my blog, Strange and Random Happenstance during An Excess of Chicks: Chick Lit Month (April 2014)Nicky Hobbs loves her job teaching school, even if she often dwells on the fact that her life at thirty is far different from the life she dreamed she'd have when she was twenty three. Well, only her ex Rob knows she wanted to be married by now with three kids... too bad she's working with him, and soon closer then ever. Rob and Nicky are appointed deputy heads of the school which it turns out is a way to test their suitability to see who would be the ideal headmaster or mistress when the current Head, Miss James, retires. Rob really wants the job and is willing to manipulate Nicky into rethinking her life and into feeling the tick of her biological clock. Nicky doesn't realize the extent to which Rob is willing to go to get this job and thinks that maybe he has turned over a new leaf, much like the new employee at the school, Mark Samuels. Mark Samuels is the father of Nicky's favorite student, Oscar. Mark Samuels is the absentee parent from hell who Nicky decides to throw the gauntlet at. Mark picks it up and by the time they are working together he is a new man... could he even be Nicky's new man? But Nicky is so confused that by the end of the school year she won't even know which end is up or what her future might hold. Melissa Nathan ranks right up there in my mind as the pinnacle of Chick Lit. She was one of, if not the first Chick Lit author that I fell hard for. I remember being in Barnes and Noble and picking up Pride, Prejudice and Jamsin Field off one of their featured tables down the middle of the store. Besides the premise of a theatrical production of Pride and Prejudice, I had more then a little cover lust because it totally looked like Caroline Bingley (aka Anna Chancellor) with one of her hats from Four Weddings and a Funeral and yes, I really am that easily sold on a book. Because she was a British author with only one book released stateside (sometimes American publishers baffle me), Amazon UK became my drug dealer, getting me all her new releases as soon as they came out until her untimely death of Breast Cancer right around the publication of The Learning Curve.It was a sad sad day for Chick Lit when Melissa passed. Based on the quality of her work what might she have gone on to do? And now I've turned my review into a total buzzkill. Hey, at least I didn't reprint her forward to the book which had me in floods of tears. With only five books to her name I was extra hesitant to read the final unread book I had on my shelf, The Learning Curve. Once I finished this book, well, there would be no more. I kind of wish that I hadn't read it. The happy anticipation that there would always be another Melissa Nathan book out there for me to read has been replaced with the sad reality of how awful this book was. Sometimes looking forward to something is so much more satisfying then the reality, and the reality of this book is painful.Before ripping apart The Learning Curve for it's themes, I have to tackle something that just drove me round the bend. This book was riddled with inconsistencies, not to mention an unwieldy cast of characters you have to memorize in the first two pages. Now, I don't know if this was because Melissa was pushing through to get this book done that they didn't bother with any kind of continuity editing, but it is a disservice if this is the case. Seriously, edit this book and get it back to me without the days of the week being helter skelter, with Friday occasionally being followed by Monday, and there once in awhile being a few extra days between Monday and Thursday. Seeing as we all live by the calendar, the least this book could do is follow said calendar.But the temporal issues are nothing compared to clothes magically changing from leaving for school till arriving at school. Shoes being high heels then flats. But worst of all, in the beginning of the book Oscar's camera phone is a big plot point and then when he's spying on teachers during the school trip he has to use a crappy disposable camera? Um, us the freakin' phone! OK, I've got to stop being nitpicky about this, and other little things like how plodding the pace is, how I dislike every character, how sometimes it all just goes a little creepy with blackmail and inappropriate student teacher relationships, how is Nicky at thirty even qualified to be a headmistress, and how crap Johnny English is so stop using it as the only movie mentioned, and move onto other things. Ok, I think I got the rant out. All these problems could have been fixable but the truth is it wouldn't have fixed the book.Through the entire book there are strained relationships between the males and females. I wouldn't even say strained covers it, it has such an antagonistic dynamic that when it even turns a little violent in the last few chapters I can't say I was surprised. There was anger and tears and recrimination behind this battle of the sexes. It all boils down to the age old question of men being the ones with the jobs and women being the ones rearing the children. With Nicky we get almost 600 pages of her griping about children/career/children/career/children/career/children/career. There is no progress with this internal and external dialogue, there is just the dialogue. Nicky is baby crazy but can't justify giving up her career to have kids and therefore bemoans this for hundreds and hundreds of pages. I think she really needs some psychological help.Of course it doesn't help that her supposed best friend who happens to be her ex is playing on these doubts. But seriously, there was never any furthering of the dialogue or a change to it, just a broken record going over and over and over the same bloody tune till I hated this book and the read rage fully embraced my soul. Just writing this review I want to take this book and hurl it out a window. You can usually tell how much I care for a book by the treatment I give it. Those I love and cherish don't have creased spines or loose pages... this one looks like it was run over by a truck, which then backed over it again and again... besides breaking the spine I think I loosened the pages enough that if I were ever to try to read it again in some masochistic torture, well, they'd all fall out. Right now I'm wondering if book burning is a good idea... I'm a little cold and this book is quite thick... stop it brain, just stop it. Constructive criticism. Legitimate reasons for the hate, don't rant, critique.But the heart of this book I think is the sad truth that Melissa Nathan knew she was dying. Look at the story, not Nicky's, but Mark's. Mark is a single workaholic father who lost his wife when his son Oscar was four. Melissa's husband Andrew lost her when their son Sam was three. So there's a part of me that doesn't want to criticize this book. There's a part of me that thinks perhaps this book was cathartic, that Melissa needed to write it. She was writing a story to tell her husband that he could move on as long as what he did was doing what was best for their son Sam. That it's not about being trapped in the past but knowing that life goes on. This then becomes such a personal book it's almost too sad to bear. Maybe she should have just gifted it to her husband and not put it out there in the world. It's a jumbled mess of unlikable characters and mixed messages and in the end, a dying woman's message to her husband of hope and love. This sad yet kind of creepy revelation makes me feel like a peeping tom that has just written a scathing review of someones innermost thoughts. Perhaps it's for the best that she can never see this review.
A group of teachers at a London school have a year of miscommunications and confusion in their professional life as well as in their personal lives. The Year 6 teacher Miss Nicky Hobbs has her hands full with her newest class, especially when she discovers one of her favorite pupils (Oscar Samuels) has a father that doesn’t seem to be a part of his life. The ear full that Nicky gave to Mark Samuels was a career ender, if he told her boss, but maybe it is the eye opener that Mark needs to become a better father. A very large, long book that had a lot happening all the time. The beginning of the book took a very long time (about 100 pages) to get to the point. Normally I like back story and ‘more information’, but this one almost had more than necessary. While I enjoyed the romance of the main characters (Nicky, Mark and Oscar) that part seemed rushed at the end. It was a complicated romance with a lot of working parts all the way around. Once I was able to get into the story, it was fun and sometimes funny with all of the misdirection.
What do You think about The Learning Curve (2006)?
oh how fluffy was that??? lovely. i'm a teacher too, so even better. hunky hero. good constellation with somewhat evil possible lover, a proper evil woman person as antagonist and some lovely kids. the book also didn't gloss over the fact that teachers work a lot and are under a lot of stress so that recognition was good to read. nice on the ego. the writing just flowed and despite its considerable length for a novel it felt like a short book. (or maybe i remember the page count wrong?) remember holding it and it felt thick. so:- the story was nicely thought out.- the characters were well drawn and believable, i even recognised the types (and their actions) in my school. - it read well. a nice diversion.- fluffy.not sure about the prologue though. almost put the book aside and stopped reading. but my colleague lent it to me and wanted to know how i liked it. well - utterly enjoyable is what. she lent me another one which i will read in time. and with pleasure.
—Antonia
I really enjoyed this book, as I have all of Melissa Nathan's books. The saddest thing about this book though, is that it was the last of Ms Nathan's books before she passed away at the age of 37. I wait impatiently for the next books from all of my favourite authors, and it's hard to comprehend that there will be no more books from this delightful author. I feel so very sad that I have now read all of Ms Nathan's books, and that there won't be anymore 'first time' joys from reading her books. I'll be reading her earlier books again, in the hopes that I don't remember them too well. What I love about Melissa Nathan is that she isn't like other romance authors, in that she doesn't get the two main characters together too early in the book. She builds on their relationship in a friendly manner first, as relationships go in the 'real world'. I'd highly recommend this book and all of her others.
—Sandra
Mlle Alice, pouvez-vous nous raconter votre rencontre avec The Learning Curve? "C'est d'abord avec ses deux austeneries, "Acting up" et "Persuading Annie" que j'ai découvert Melissa Nathan. Puis j'ai enchaîné avec ses autres romans, "The Nanny" et "The Waitress" que j'ai beaucoup aimé. Il ne me restait plus que celui-ci."Dites-nous en un peu plus sur son histoire... "Nicky Hobbs est enseignante dans une école primaire qu'elle adore mais à trente ans, elle aimerait trouver l'amour et avoir enfin des enfants. Mais quand une promotion va se présenter, tout va changer, se bousculer et elle va devoir faire des choix pour son avenir."Mais que s'est-il exactement passé entre vous? "J'ai lu ce roman à un moment où la disponibilité de mon cerveau était vraiment à sa capacité minimum et où j'avais également assez peu de temps. Du coup, j'ai mis presque 200 pages à rentrer dans l'histoire et j'ai trouvé le début un peu longuet. Mais une fois que je me suis prise au jeu, j'ai retrouvé les éléments qui me séduisent toujours chez Melissa Nathan: des personnages très attachants et des sujets sérieux, des questions existentielles traités sur fond de légèreté. Ici l'héroïne se demande si oui ou non une femme peut mener sa carrière à bien et être mère en même temps, ce que l'auteur qualifie très justement de définition même de la culpabilité."Et comment cela s'est-il fini? "J'ai beaucoup apprécié la fin, même si elle est sans grande surprise. La scène où les "méchants" sont démasqués, moment que j'attends toujours avec grande impatience, est très bien amenée et amusante. En revanche, malgré toutes ses qualités et sans vraiment pouvoir dire pourquoi, c'est sûrement le livre de Melissa Nathan que j'ai le moins aimé, même si je les aime tous!"http://booksaremywonderland.hautetfor...
—Alice
