Something Borrowed

So, I read a chick lit type book. It's vacation so I guess I can do what I want with my time. Emily Giffin's book did get me thinking about Jane Austen, actually. Not because there's much in common, mind you, but I was trying to figure out why I was so irritated by Giffin's main character, Rachel. Partly I had trouble with her name. Rachel. Don't get me wrong, I like the name Rachel. One of my cousins is named Rachel and it's perfectly lovely, but it just doesn't seem right for a fiance-stealing 30 year old, big firm lawyer. Anyway, her name is not what made me think of Jane Austen. I was irritated by Rachel because she is incredibly passive and I've decided this is a trait I can't stand in a character even if that character gets the opportunity to transform by novel's end, as all characters should.

What makes Jane Asuten's books still resonate today is that her characters are anything but passive. In fact, they generally seem anachronistically active in their own lives. There's a reason that Persuasion is arguably the least popular Austen novel. You just want to throttle Anne for sitting around and missing her opportunity at love and life. She's no Elizabeth Bennett or Emma. Yes, those are flawed characters, but for heaven's sake they have a personality.

Darcy has more of a personality (it's always easier to write the 'villain'), but she is generally unlikeable in Something Borrowed, so much so that I saw it as a further flaw in Rachel that they'd ever been friends to begin with. Certainly it was hard to believe their friendship had lasted into adulthood. There's something about old friends, but there's also such a thing as growing up and out of Indiana and into a life in NYC. I know it's been awhile since I was 30 (not THAT long, but still...), and I was certainly never single at that age, so what do I know? But these women didn't act their age. I mean, honestly, how much awkward kissing on a couch happens at that age?

Giffin seems to have written a whole series with embarrassing titles like Something Blue and Something New (or whatnot) and I had to hide the cover of this one under my other serious books at the library (yes, yes, I'm sad), but the titles are almost redeemed by the fact that the next book, Something Blue, seems to be narrated by Darcy herself. Apparently it's her chance to tell her side of the story after her supposed best friend steals her beloved fiance. I'm a sucker for multiple view points of the same story, (though I probably won't read the next installment) so this seems clever to me.

Darcy's definitely the more interesting character. Dex is your basic good guy and Rachel is utterly boring in many ways so I'm hopeful that Giffin lets the girl you love to hate really rant on in Something Blue. She's got a lot to say and may remind readers of Eleanor's younger sister in Sense and Sensibility or, more likely, Elizabeth Bennett's horror of a sister, Lydia. NOT that I'm really comparing Emily Giffin to Jane Austen, but, you know, you could...

**I just discovered that Something Borrowed, the movie, will begin filming this spring. Of course it will. It probably will make a very entertaining movie. They'll just have to cast a good personality for Rachel (and not overdo Darcy's worst qualities).**