Customer Reviews

Undomestic Goddess, The

5 star:		(170)
4 star:		(133)
3 star:		(52)
2 star:		(24)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

The Undomestic Goddess is yet anotherwinner from Sophie Kinsella. I read the book in a day and a half because it was a easy fun read. Samantha Sweeting is a hard working lawyer who is on her way to being made a partner at her firm-until she makes a mistake. Samantha then panics and goes into the English countryside. Samantha is mistaken for a housekeeper and she can't seem to find a way to tell her employers Trish and Eddie the truth. So she struggles to learn to cook and clean and this leads to some funny situations. I believe that another amazon.com reviewer said that they found it hard to believe that she became a "world class chef" so quickly, but I didn't find that to be true. She learns to cook but I don't know if I would classify as a her cooking as world class chef cooking. I found the love story in the book to be very sweet. Although, I personally liked the Shopaholic series and Can you keep a secret?, The Undomestic Goddess is a good funny book and I recommend it to anyone who likes Sophie Kinsella and anyone who is a fan of chic-lit books.

I am a big Can You Keep a Secret fan, so I was looking forward to a SK book that wasn't part of the Shopaholic series. The book is very cute and also interesting, but totally unrealistic. Of course, SK's books are all a bit unrealistic, but this one is plain silly. The book tries to end about 3 or 4 times before actually coming to a conclusion. It was a cute book but fell apart at the end. If you like SK, you'll prolly be able to look past the flaws, and you'll like this book. I wish that I'd borrowed it from the library instead of purchasing it, though.

Another good read from Sophie Kinsella. I found myself laughing out loud at bits. This book follows Samantha, a 29 year old lawyer, who is on the fast track to partner of her law firm. Her life is going in the direction she, and her mum, want. Long hours at the office, take away food, and no time off make up Samantha's life. After a mishap at the office, Samantha takes off, and finds herself living a simpler life - with time for herself - although, she is living a lie as a housekeeper.

Her adjustment to this lifestyle is funny; this is a girl who has no idea about keeping house at all. Will her lies catch up with her? Will the life she strived for from a young age, law, call her back to London? The book was not too predictable, which I really liked. The narrative was good, and I really got into the storyline and hoped Samantha made the right decisions in the end.

Although Sophie Kinsella's protagonists often exasperate me, I found Samantha to be a much more likable and realistic character compared to Becky of the Shopaholic series. I certainly related to her feelings of getting out of the fast-paced rat race of her high powered career in the big city and finding happiness in a simpler life that allows for rewarding downtime. This story had more substance than the Shopaholic books too, as Samantha clears her name and restores her professional reputation, and then must face the dilemma of returning to her old life as expected of her, or following her heart. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that the authors style of writing, especially the dialogue, is as funny and enjoyable as always, and makes the book move along smoothly with lots of laughing out loud!

I enjoy an occasional chick-lit book, and I've been hearing things about Kinsella's Shopaholic series for a while. So, when I saw this novel on the library shelf, I thought I'd give it a try.

The novel opens with Samantha Sweeting, a 29 year old British corporate lawyer, filling out a questionnaire to determine her stress level. It's obvious from the start that this likeable lady has her priority list of of whack, as does the rest of her family. On the eve of the meeting to determine whether she will become her firm's youngest partner, an encounter with her elderly, tounge-clucking neighbor foreshadows future events when the neighbor mutters how sad it is that Samantha can't even sew a missing button onto her shirt.

Samantha, already high-strung, is even more so when she arrives at work the next day, anticipating what the decision will be regarding her partnership. To relax, she begins to clear mountains of paperwork off her desk. In so doing, she finds a month's-old memo saying that she was to file some paperwork. With horror, Samantha realizes she's made a beginner's blunder. The situation escalates when she discovers that this blunder can't be corrected and that she's lost a client 50 million pounds. In shock, she flees the office and randomly hops on a train out of the city. Lost and heartsick, wandering through some small town, she decides to ask for an aspirin and water at the next home. In doing so, she is mistaken for a new housekeeper applicant and due to the "stronger than aspirin" medicine she is given, isn't thinking straight

Samantha decides to salvage her life and pretend that she really is a housekeeper, especially since she has become a laughingstock in the legal world. Predictable disasters occur with this can't-boil-water type. Thankfully, there is a hunky gardener, Nathaniel, whose mother teaches Samantha on the sly how to cook and clean. Predictable consequences follow with the handsome gardener.

Just when Samantha is accustomed to her new life and really thriving, a discovery sets her head spinning and causes her to question what she wants out of life--the new or the old. What is most important to her?

There is occasional swearing and mild sex (mentioned, not overtly explicit). The scenes at times can seem a bit "movie-ish" (especially the ending). But, the characters are all very likeable. The nouveau-rich employers, the gardener/pub owner/boyfriend, the crazy best friend who also happens to be titled, even the stern head lawyer at the firm all are nicely crafted and enjoyable to read about.

If you are looking for a light-hearted read which might make you think a bit about your own chaotic life, then this might be a nice evening's read for you.

What a silly book! I love Kinsella's other books, particularly the Shopaholic series, but geez...the situations in this book are laughable (and not because they're funny). Although I made it through the book, it was not a pageturner and I was not drawn in by the characters or situations. Even if you're a fan of Sophie's like I am, skip this one.

I guess even the great Sophie Kinsella can write a clunker once. Having dearly loved the Shopaholic books plus her other two free-standing ones, I was anxious to read this. Happily, it did have her trademark humor and slightly unrealistic situations up to a point. I am more than willing to suspend reality when reading chick lit and relish the pure joy of the situation, the humor, and the romance. But in the last fifty pages of this one, the writer lost me both emotionally and intellectually. Samantha Sweeting ceased to be the high-powered London lawyer who through goofy circumstances became a domestic in the English countryside. She became an utter fool. I always pass on Sophie Kinsella's books to my twenty-something daughter who loves her work as much as I do, but I will put a warning label on this one...happiness is not available to only the poor. Career women with fast-track and highly responsible jobs can also find happiness and romance.

I'm happy to say that REMEMBER ME, her next free-standing book, is excellent and on a par with the incomparable Shopaholic series. I'll continue to always read her books, but this is not one I could recommend.

If this is your first encounter with Sophie Kinsella's joyous writing, you will not be disappointed and will be eager to read more of her work. For those fans of the Shopaholic series, this book will be another addition to your collection of fabulous, fun reads in the Kinsella style! However, be warned that Samantha Sweeting is not Becky Bloomwood. Although Bloomwood from the Shopaholic series is great fun and addictive reading, with Samantha Sweeting, Kinsella brings more depth to the main character.

Sweeting is a lawyer nearing her 30's and on her way to becoming a partner in a prestigious law firm. However, her work is her life spurred on by an over achieving mother and what Samantha has thought is the life she really wants. When she discovers a crash-and-burn mistake she made at her Carter Spink Law Firm, and that it will cost the firm dearly, she flees London with no thoughts in mind as to where she is going or what she will do.

This is what brings Samantha Sweeting to a tiny suburb of London and to the home of Trish and Eddie Geiger. The Geigers mistake Samantha for a housekeeping job applicant they had been expecting. In her frantic need to get away from the problems in London, Samantha goes along with the mistaken identity and takes the job thinking it will at least give her a place to stay for a few days to think things through. She fails to consider the fact that a housekeeper is expected to cook and clean, something that is low on Samantha's list of qualifications. Cooking to her means "order in", and cleaning is something that miraculously has happened when she gets home from the firm and the help has taken care of things. With the reader's imagination allowing for a few impractical and unreal situations, Samantha is able to fool the Geigers with her quick thinking and chicanery.

Things go fine for a bit until Samantha encounters a wise and dreamy gardener who is not so blind to what she is doing. With "creative" genius, Samantha keeps things going in the house for a while but the gorgeous and clever gardener becomes a problem as she finds herself attracted to him. The hilarious situations, quirky almost believable characters, and a Samantha that you care about, is what Kinsella creates in The Undomestic Goddess and what makes for an enjoyable, funny, and light read that will entertain you and keep you turning the pages to find out what happens to Samantha.

This book is about a woman who abandoned her entire life, to re-create herself and find new happiness. The book follows the main character while she pretends to know how to be maid...even though she has no idea how to cook or clean. A romance blossoms, and the writing surrounding it is very descriptive, which makes you want to breeze through the book. This is a great way to dive into Kinsella's writing. This book will have you laughing out loud, and blushing at the same time. Good read!

When you settle in with a Sophie Kinsella book, you need to pack away your cynic's hat. Because these books can be a fantastic indulgence, but not if you turn each page with an eye out for the faults.

In The Undomestic Goddess, the main character is a tough, successful London attorney. Everything in her life is exaggerated in typical Kinsella style: Her family blows off her birthday, she can't picture a vacuum cleaner bag, she works All The Time.

Then, she apparently makes a major mistake. When she realizes its ramifications, she freaks out and flees blindly to the countryside. Then, in typically whacky Kinsella style, she becomes a housekeeper to a nouveau-riche couple.

Of course, she learns to do the job well, sneakily handles some legal work for her boss, falls in love, relaxes, becomes more beautiful, and exposes some major corruption back in London.

Even if you like this syrupy and silly kind of story, there are some major issues with the premise. Why is it that working women are so often portrayed as colorless, unhappy and unfulfilled? The message that giving up your career for a country life of bread-baking, that just seems to be an old-fashioned, even anti-woman message. I don't want to spoil the fun of the book, but that's a pretty major problem.

I also thought Kinsella missed a chance to tie up a lot of loose ends. Even if she'd added a "Six Months Later" final chapter, she could have told us what happened to her nouveau riche couple's legal tangles, if the lady of the house found a fulfilling volunteer opporunity, and many other tidbits.

Kinsella is a delightful writer. Her characters are loopy and self-effacing, if over-the-top. If you can get past the silliness, and the troubling anti-working-woman premise of the plot, this is a funny, joyful read. In fact, I'd say it's one of her best books ever.