Book review- One Day by David Nicholls

If you read my post on the Emmy's you'd have realized I watch way too much TV. It's a good thing then, when summer rolls around and most of my favourite shows are taking a sabbatical and I catch up on my reading. Over the past few weeks I've been quite the book fiend, and whizzed through the Millennium trilogy, which started with The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. If you read my review and picked up that book, you HAVE to complete the series and go through Book 2 and 3. The last one, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest is more like a sequel to the second book, The Girl Who Played with Fire, and takes a while getting into, as you just assume it's boring and that you know everything that is going to happen. Not true. Trust me, they're all must reads.

After going through them, I wanted a book that was just as absorbing, but was a quick read and went away from the action and drama of the Millennium Trilogy. On browsing the book store, I found the book One Day under their recommended summer reading. It looked like it was based on the relationship between two people, but wasn't just a boring romance novel with a predictable ending. Moreover, the book would start with the meeting between Emily and Dexter, one day after they graduate college in 1988, and would follow their lives over 20 years, giving the reader a snapshot of what went on on the same day, 15th July, over those years. I was curious about how the writer would handle that and would keep the book interesting, again without getting boring or predictable. The book also seemed to have great reviews from critics and fellow authors, including Nick Hornby who proclaimed it to be, "The perfect beach read for people who are normally repelled by the very idea of beach reads."
When I started on the book, it wasn't half as gripping as I'd have liked it to be, but that changed as the book went on. However, one thing that didn't change was the way I felt about the characters. I went from disliking Emily, to disliking Dexter, to disliking the both of them, and then towards the end, disliking the author for making them star-crossed lovers whose fate would either end in them being deliriously happy, which would eventually make the book predictable (there's that word again!) or tragically miserable, in which case Shakespeare's been there, done that. Was the book all horrible though? Not at all, which is why I kept reading.
I'm a sucker for chick-flicks and I love my share of chick-lit too, and there were moments in the book that are genuinely cute and make you want to know what's going to happen next, which is a great thing when you want the reader to stick around till the end of the story. There were also moments I found myself giggling, and the rare moments where, to my horror, I found myself holding the book in my hand with tears streaming down my face. At the end, I thought it was a light read and like Hornby had predicted, would be great as a beach or poolside read, if you don't want something too gripping. Also read it if you like romance novels but are in the mood for something a little different. However, I've honestly read better.