Synopsis

Sally Milz is a sketch writer for “The Night Owls,” the late-night live comedy show that airs each Saturday. With a couple of heartbreaks under her belt, she’s long abandoned the search for love, settling instead for the occasional hook-up, career success, and a close relationship with her stepfather to round out a satisfying life.

But when Sally’s friend and fellow writer Danny Horst begins dating Annabel, a glamorous actor who guest-hosted the show, he joins the not-so-exclusive group of talented but average-looking and even dorky men at the show – and in society at large – who’ve gotten romantically involved with incredibly beautiful and accomplished women. Sally channels her annoyance into a sketch called the “Danny Horst Rule,” poking fun at this phenomenon while underscoring how unlikely it is that the reverse would ever happen for a woman.

Enter Noah Brewster, a pop music sensation with a reputation for dating models, who signed on as both host and musical guest for this week’s show. Dazzled by his charms, Sally hits it off with Noah instantly, and as they collaborate on one sketch after another, she begins to wonder whether there might actually be sparks flying. But this isn’t a romantic comedy; it’s real life. And in real life, someone like him would never date someone like her… right?

Review

This book took me completely by surprise – I did not expect to love it as much as I did, but ended up binging the whole thing one Sunday afternoon.

Having enjoyed a few of Curtis Sittenfeld’s books, I was very excited to read her latest novel, which is her best yet. The writing is sharp, funny and relatable, which is a winning combination. It’s also partially set during the pandemic and whilst this is usually a big no for me, in this instance it added to the book’s charm and the scenes made up entirely of emails reminded me of Impossible by Sarah Lotz (my favourite book of 2022).

Part of the concept revolves around the ‘idea ‘Danny Horst rule’ that unattractive and older men can date younger, hotter women… but rarely does this happen the other way around. Sittenfeld uses the theme to discuss the differing confidence levels of men and women. Is this why women are more likely to date an unattractive man? Is this why men are more likely to leave their partners for a younger, hotter model?

Reading this definitely made me look at friends to test this rule, with which I would strongly agree. I also enjoyed the creation of the skits for the TV room, although I admit I didn’t think any of them were hilarious. However, this is often the case with a script, versus performance and the insight into how the sketches are created was fascinating. Sittenfeld is excellent at observational writing, providing readers with insight into worlds with which they may not be familiar. Fiction though her stories are, they are based on fact.

What I liked most (epilogue aside) was that the romance was believable and the story as a whole was less predictable than expected – not least because Sally continuously mocks the concept of a romantic comedy. There were also a lot of sub plots that gave the story depth and maturity, meaning that I was invested in the romance, but only because it fitted nicely to the main story and wasn’t the main focus of the book.

Some people have complained about the lack of chapters, but I didn’t even notice which shows how immersed I was in the writing and story. I did despise the epilogue which really irritated me and completely undervalued the whole story, but decided it wasn’t enough to drop a star!

Heartfelt, charming and at times hilarious, this is a firm contender for my book of the year.

Thanks to DoubleDay for my finished copy. Opinions my own.

Other books by Curtis Sittenfeld: Rodham