Welcome to My Planet: Where English Is Sometimes Spoken [Paperback]

Shannon Olson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 5, 2001

Life just isn't The Love Boat for nearly-thirty Shannon, the tongue-in-cheek heroine of Welcome to My Planet. Credit cards don't pay themselves, no obvious mate has appeared with her name pinned to his collar, and a job doing new-product research for a fledgling software company doesn't quite make ends meet in the meaning-of-life department. Then there's the loser boyfriend, another boyfriend, her therapist, and unforgettably, Shannon's mom, Flo, with her unrecognizable leftover casseroles and quirky advice for her daughter. In a fit of debt and with a bruised heart, Shannon moves back home to witness the day-to-day tremors of her parents' own marriage. This is a dark-and-light tale-freshly witty and poignant-told by a young woman with a universal touch.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In Welcome to My Planet, the fictional Shannon Olson--who shares her creator's name--is witty but confused, whip-smart but unable to fully release her ties to bad boyfriends, childhood obsessions, and the "gassy expanse" of marginal jobs. With the help of a therapist known only as the counselor, this almost 30-year-old Midwestern neurotic gamely tries to steer her way past credit-card-fueled Target binges and a too close relationship with her mother, Flo, and to slowly inch toward the elusive land of adulthood. Comparisons to the charming neurotics found in Bridget Jones's Diary and The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing are inevitable, but beside the point: Shannon is less brittle, less self-consciously hip than those postmodern heroines. Contemplating living on her own again after a stint with her parents, she whines to the counselor, "I've never really lived anywhere else. What if I never find anyone? I may as well go out and adopt a bunch of cats and start wearing macramé ponchos."

Olson's debut easily pulls us in with a conversational, seemingly unadorned style that camouflages her well-crafted narrative technique as she moves back and forth in time. With her retro and up-to-the-minute pop-culture references to The Love Boat, grieving conferences, Prozac, Oprah, bachelorette parties, and the ravages of graduate school (where Babe the Gallant Pig is a "text"), the author clearly knows her target audience. Welcome to My Planet is an almost perfect coming-of-age story for an era in which public life, jazzed by lightning technological and commercial changes, leapfrogs away while emotional adolescence strangely extends into our 30s. --Maura Alia Bramkamp --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

The protagonist of this excellent debut novel has much in common with its author: they share the same name, they're both in their early 30s, live in Minnesota and have a mother named Flo. In funny, self-conscious prose, Olson chronicles her heroine's life between ages 25 and 30. Shannon goes to therapy, frets about her credit card debt and her boyfriend Michael's obsessive need to organize his time, slogs away at an unsatisfying job at a software company and eventually decides to move back into her parents' home. The neurotic middle child between her (married) brother and her (married) sister, Shannon chats endearingly and self-deprecatingly about her anxieties and her complicated relationship with Flo. Having grown up watching Love Boat on TV, Shannon admits she's absorbed the fantasy of old-fashioned, tidy love: "All my life, for as long as I can remember, I've wanted to be married. I'm not sure why. I guess I just thought that that's when my life would start." But Shannon never quite faces her feelings. She's more likely to produce a witty pun than tell her mother she loves her. Even when Flo is hospitalized for surgery, Shannon copes with the crisis with humor, a strategy she's learned from her wisecracking mom. Getting older, feeling aimless, Shannon enrolls in grad school, cuts her hours at work and moves in with Michael. When their affair hits troubled waters, she finally turns to Flo for advice and learns that Flo views her own marriage as a failure. Olson's premise is hardly original in a market flooded with sassy young women's fiction, but she has a realistic voice readers can relate to, and, unlike others in the genre, she isn't trying to be edgy and hip. The book meanders but is honest and compelling; the ordinary woman's search for self is grounded sturdily in the resilient, charming mother/daughter relationship at the novel's heart. Agent, Gloria Loomis. 10-city author tour. (June)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (June 5, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0141001771
• ISBN-13: 978-0141001777
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.1 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (98 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,818,869 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I just finished reading it, and I already miss Shannon!, May 22, 2000

By 

"missanderson" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Welcome to My Planet (Hardcover)

What a fabulous book, capturing the TRUE essence of being a 30 something female in the year 2000! I read it all afternoon, lying by the pool. It's the first time I have read a book of this size in one sitting. I simply couldn't put it down! I could so identify with the main character, Shannon, a woman in her mid 20's to early 30's, who deals with grad school, credit card debt, a quirky mom she sometimes resents and sometimes clings to, boyfriends who aren't "the one", and trying to make sense of it all in therapy. The realest coming of age story I have ever read. I can't wait to pass it on to my friends to read, and I can't wait for the author, Shannon Olson, to write her second novel.

27 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A realistic, relatable, and funny character, June 27, 2000

By 

A. Maxham "Just trying to help..." - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Welcome to My Planet (Hardcover)

The reviews I had read of this book, both in People magazine, here on Amazon, and elsewhere had led me to believe that this book was a laugh a minute- sorta like Bridget Jones. Well, it is, but it isn't. The Bridget Jones books are cartoons, really- exaggerations of life.

This book is really more realistic and less extreme. Shannon (the main character here) doesn't obsesses and worry about her body every second, but those worries about her thighs and breasts do exist and are a part of her character.

She is 30, she is single, hates her job, dates a loser who treats her like crap and tries to have sex with her while she's asleep, her younger sister does get married out from under her, she is depressed, she does love Target (I hear ya, sister)- but those are the superficial elements of the story.

The way I see it, this story is best exemplified by this: her mom is sick, and needs surgery. Her mom says to Shannon, "Sickness is a part of life. I look at this as an adventure, an opportunity to learn." And Shannon replies, "I hate learning. I wish we could all be dumb and happy." Really, this book is about Shannon's recognition that you can't just stay dumb and happy- that you have to learn and stop making the same mistakes with men and career because otherwise, you'll have the same unhappiness over and over again.

This book is about growing up and realizing that life isn't fair, and people aren't fair, and you have to quit expecting fairness and trying to control things that you have no control over. And it's about recognizing how you got those expectations. Her mom (Flo), asks Shannon, "Did your father and I do this to you? Is it something we didn't do?" And Shannon replies, "Women's magazines did this to me. Watching Love Boat did this. I did this to myself."

I really liked this book- it's quiet and normal- Bridget is chaotic and drunk and smoking and I laughed my way all the way through Bridget. But I could relate to Shannon because she was real, in a way very much like the character in The Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing (except not placed in ubiquitous New York).

This does NOT mean that this book isn't funny- it's hilarious. Shannon's sense of humor is extremely dry, and she is really a great writer. I can't wait for her next book.

I really see this book and "Getting Over It" as sort of the next evolution in what could best be described as the Single/30 literature.

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good, but different, July 5, 2001

By 

Dianna Johnston "Compulsive Reader" (Joplin, MO) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Welcome to My Planet: Where English Is Sometimes Spoken (Paperback)

It's hard to say exactly how I feel about this book -- and probably even harder to explain! Welcome to My Planet is a different kind of novel, one that doesn't just jump right out at you with a clear-cut, black and white, obvious storyline. It's a thinker novel, not breezy or light-hearted. While there are many funny moments, the dark tones outweigh the light ones by far.

Welcome to My Planet is told in parts and interspersed with many counselor sessions that tend to ramble on about the intricate workings of an under-stimulated mind. The heroine, almost-30 Shannon Olson (oddly the same name as the author), is very disappointed in life. She expected everything to be easy and the opposite of what she's gotten so far. Beginning with a no-good boyfriend, a meaningless job, and a obsessive dependency on her mother, Shanny's story seems very miserable and lonely. Her counselor sessions start fairly soon with expectations that maybe she can work her depression out, but the progress is very long and drawn out. Reading this novel was very stressful at times. Shanny was a very unpleasant character, very self-absorbed, never taking care of herself and always obsessing about those around her. While this does not necessarily make this a bad novel, I think for me personally, it made it a little unattractive to enjoy.

Good points about the book: Shanny has a very wry sense of humor which I always enjoy. When reflecting on her growing up years, Shanny and her sister deliver some funny moments. Also Shanny's mother, Flo, is an absolute scene-stealer. I believe the humorous parts is the saving grace of this book -- without them it would be far too depressing.

Sounds like I don't have much good to say. Welcome to My Planet is just a little hard to explain. It's vagueness bothered me, as well as the continuous gear-switching -- going back and forth in time was a little tough to get used to. For those who enjoy a mix of pleasure and pain (psychologists would have a field day with this one), endings that leave room for interpretation, and a diversity in characters, I recommend this book with two thumbs up.