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Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
Dec 2014, 304 pages
Paperback:
Jul 2015, 304 pages
Book Reviewed by:
Elena Spagnolie
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The highly anticipated sequel to the New York Times bestselling novel The Rosie Project, starring the same extraordinary couple now living in New York and unexpectedly expecting their first child. Get ready to fall in love all over again.
Don Tillman and Rosie Jarman are back. The Wife Project is complete, and Don and Rosie are happily married and living in New York. But they're about to face a new challenge because - surprise - Rosie is pregnant.
Don sets about learning the protocols of becoming a father, but his unusual research style gets him into trouble with the law. Fortunately his best friend Gene is on hand to offer advice: he's left Claudia and moved in with Don and Rosie.
As Don tries to schedule time for pregnancy research, getting Gene and Claudia to reconcile, servicing the industrial refrigeration unit that occupies half his apartment, helping Dave the Baseball Fan save his business, and staying on the right side of Lydia the social worker, he almost misses the biggest problem of all: he might lose Rosie when she needs him the most.
Graeme Simsion first introduced these unforgettable characters in The Rosie Project, which NPR called "sparkling entertainment along the lines of Where'd You Go Bernadette and When Harry Met Sally." The San Francisco Chronicle said, "sometimes you just need a smart love story that will make anyone, man or woman, laugh out loud." If you were swept away by the book that's captivated a million readers worldwide, you will love The Rosie Effect.
ONE
Orange juice was not scheduled for Fridays. Although Rosie and I had abandoned the Standardized Meal System, resulting in an improvement in "spontaneity" at the expense of shopping time, food inventory, and wastage, we had agreed that each week should include three alcohol-free days. Without formal scheduling, this target proved difficult to achieve, as I had predicted. Rosie eventually saw the logic of my solution.
Fridays and Saturdays were obvious days on which to consume alcohol. Neither of us had classes on the weekend. We could sleep late and possibly have sex.
Sex was absolutely not allowed to be scheduled, at least not by explicit discussion, but I had become familiar with the sequence of events likely to precipitate it: a blueberry muffin from Blue Sky Bakery, a triple shot of espresso from Otha's, removal of my shirt, and my impersonation of Gregory Peck in the role of Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird. I had learned not to do all four in the same sequence ...
It’s difficult not to compare sequels to their original counterparts, and all too often sequels take something that was fresh and imaginative and repeat the same jokes until they aren’t funny, or make unique characters mere caricatures of themselves. And while I suppose there’s a hint of that in The Rosie Effect, I actually like the second book more than the first. It successfully maintains a light-hearted, comical tone, and the new scenarios are funnier (even if a little more suspension of disbelief is required). Fans of the original have plenty to look forward to...continued
Full Review
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(Reviewed by Elena Spagnolie).
The star of Graeme Simsion's The Rosie Effect, Don Tillman, is a unique character to say the least. His awkwardness in social settings, his overly logical and mathematical mind, his knack for offending people with blunt truths, and his tendency to obsess over the details of Rosie's pregnancy all combine to create a charming and unwittingly entertaining protagonist. While it isn't explicitly discussed in the book, Don shows clear signs of Asperger syndrome (AS), a high-functioning form of autism that was first described by Dr. Hans Asperger, an Austrian pediatrician, in 1944.
According to the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), Asperger syndrome is "an autism spectrum disorder (ASD), one of a distinct group ...
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