Tuesday, August 1, 2017

What's Sara Reading?: Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine


Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine. Or so the novel by Gail Honeyman claims.

I mean, she IS fine, technically. She has a steady job (one she has had for years), her own apartment, a devoted and devilishly handsome boyfriend, and talks to her mother every week like a good daughter should. Fine, right?



Right - except everyone in the office thinks she's a total weirdo and gossips about her behind her back, she spends weekends closed up in her apartment drinking liters of vodka straight up to keep a steady buzz, her boyfriend is really the singer of a local band who doesn't even know she exists, and her mother is evil and emotionally abusive, taking any chance she can to tear Eleanor down.


After a bout of depression, Eleanor begins seeing a therapist and her past begins to reveal itself to the reader and even Eleanor herself. We soon not only learn about an abusive relationship she survived in her early twenties, but also of a deadly fire that her mother intentionally set and the spiral it caused for a young Eleanor.


Along the way, Eleanor befriends a colleague, Raymond, through a sequence of events. He fixes her computer one morning and later, the pair find themselves assisting an elderly man who collapses on the street. From there they begin having routine lunch dates and Eleanor finds herself with a true and honest friend - just in time for Eleanor's life to start unraveling ever so slightly.


I really loved this book. Though heartbreaking, I related quite a bit to Eleanor. Not with her struggles or sadness - but the content way she moved through her strictly regimented life. She needed her routines and I can totally respect and relate to that!


Through it all, though, her quirky personality shines in this book and I quite liked her. She was funny, her observations brutally honest, and she didn't beat around the bush. My kind of girl! Eleanor loved and ate pasta and pesto almost every night for dinner, for goodness sake! A girl after my own heart!


This outfit is bright and sunny and perhaps an outfit styled to fit what I hope Eleanor gets to feel in her future - happiness! She works hard throughout the book to come into her own, get rid of her mother's voice tearing her apart all the time, and feel confident in herself and her future. She has a lot of baggage and a lot of work to do but I think it's just a matter of time that she can be happy and thrive.


I saw this Charo top on LindyBop's Facebook page and immediately loved the summery colors and flirty off the shoulder sleeves and knew I needed it for the remainder of summer (because HI AUGUST WHERE DID YOU COME FROM?). I wasn't quite sure how it'd fit looking at the size chart (as I seem to be so in-between everyone's size charts these days!) so I opted to size up and got a large.


I would have been fine with the medium but oh well. The top is a bit big on me, but since the straps are adjustable and the off the shoulder ruffle is elasticized, it's not a bad thing. The bodice fits my bust but is awkwardly roomy at my waist. No worries there as I'll be wearing it tucked into a skirt most days anyway!


It sure looks cute belted with my first Julie Mollo retroversible skirt anyway! I felt like a walking dandelion or daffodil in this outfit and I am OK with that!