Having been a big fan of Nick Hornby since the early days of Fever Pitch and High Fidelity, was looking forward to reading this.
Hornby’s writing has always been consistently good, although it could be argued that his books from ‘About a boy’ onwards have not quite matched the initial heights of the aforementioned first two. His books tend to be based on observations and relationships, and it helps that they invariably seem to be set in North London, an area of which I’m well aquatinted with. In ‘Just like you’, Brexit and race are brought into the mix, and age gaps. What can go wrong?
Sadly for me, this is the first time a Hornby book has left me annoyed. The main plot is a 42 year old divorcee (Lucy) starting a romance with a young black man (Joseph) whom she meets at butchers. The idea appears to be that although they are different in almost every way, really, deep down, they are just like each other. The problem is, I didn’t buy it. They were nothing like each other! There was zero chemistry between them, apart from numerous references to their sex life (of which the author goes into very little detail, just tells us it is happening/ has happened). The nuances which make couples fall in love where simply not there.
Other areas are simplified down to the bare bones, almost to squeeze them in. Apparently, all divorced, middle class women have a stark choice when they hit their 40s - either shack up with a balding, impotent bore, or grab a young man and reenact ‘Last Tango in Crouch End.’ No wonder so many people stay unhappily married…
Brexit is also unnecessary. I had no desire to go through that particular annus horribilis again, and cannot see what it added (apart from to remind us that Lucy went to university and Joseph didn’t).
There were some really funny parts to the book, and some insightful observations (as you’d expect from Hornby), but this one definitely missed a trick. Would be interesting to see a film adaptation, as this will give me an opportunity to see what this couple really saw what in each other.
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