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Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman

A Costa Book Awards Winner 2017, A Sunday Times Bestseller, 

“Funny, touching and unpredictable” - JOJO MOYES

Eleanor Oliphant leads a simple life. She wears the same clothes to work every day, eats the same meal deal for lunch every day and buys the same two bottles of vodka to drink every weekend. 
Eleanor Oliphant is happy. Nothing is missing from her carefully timetabled existence. Except, sometimes, everything .........


Not in a long time has a book got me laughing out loud in the quietest of places, and having friends around me asking the borrow the book after me.
As the synopsis tells us the story is about Eleanor Oliphant. Someone who lives life doing the same things every day. Has the set routines that she follows and doesn’t really interact with people at her work if she doesn’t have to. It shows how she doesn’t always think before she speaks and has a very different way of words from the people around her.
You know she has a history, that there are issues, her drinking for one. It’s about how she copes with the changes that are happening to her and how saying yes to things that she might not of done previously. And how it takes her out of her routine.
The other main character is Raymond and the story between them both lets you see a lot of his character and is laid back style compared to Eleanor’s. Getting to know him in small amounts over time is a good way of doing it because i feel it doesn’t take away from Eleanor.
Through the writing I found it easy to picture them both and how I think they contradicted each other but became good friends. Showing that it doesn’t matter what the history or how you look it’s about talking and getting to know the person that matters.

A quote that I liked was

    “ I closed my eyes. Eyelids are really just flesh curtains. Your eyes are always ‘on’, always looking, when you close them, you’re just watching the thin, veined skin of your inner eyelid rather than staring out at the world.”

I don’t truly know why I like this quote. The visualisation that I got when reading it, or the fact that I found myself reading it over and over.

The front of the book is very relevant to the book and is a good mix I feel of text, imagery and colour.

For a debut novel GAIL HONEYMAN has done really well and I can see why she is a COSTA book awards winner. If she gets the chance to write a next book I hope it’s the same style as this book.

Overall I really do like this book and will be recommending it to others.

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