Amazon.com Review
Told with the same compassion and humor that drew readers to her bestselling book,
Beaches, Iris Rainer Dart's
When I Fall in Love is the story of one woman's search for true beauty and strength in today's cruel world. Lily Benjamin may have a great job as a comedy writer and a sweet cardiologist fiancé, but when her 15-year old son Bryan's spinal cord is severed by a gun shot, she can find no solace in humor or medicine. Bryan thinks life as a paraplegic will be dismal, and Lily can't muster any optimism either. When her new boss Charlie Roth shows little patience for her, Lily is dumbstruck. Charlie's attitude strikes her as particularly cruel and insensitive, considering his own disfigurement from cerebral palsy.
Even worse, however, is Charlie's new interest in Bryan. Determined to give Bryan and herself appropriate time to grieve, the last thing Lily wants is to have Charlie storming into the hospital and confronting them with his warped opinions on cartoon cripples. But as Bryan reacts to Charlie's offbeat humor, Lily slowly realizes that Charlie connects with Bryan in a way no one else can. Through Charlie's guidance, humor, and love, both Lily and Bryan gain a new perspective on life. As Lily reflects on her feelings for Bryan, Charlie, and her fiancé, Mark, she struggles to learn that, "It is only with the heart that one can see. What is essential is invisible to the eye."
Tackling the sensitive issues of disability and self-image, Dart's mixture of down-to-earth dialogue and realistic character development keeps the After-School-Special-Syndrome at arm's length. Our heroes have human flaws, and--with the exception of a minor wife-beating character--our villains are sympathetic. The evolution of Lily's own attitudes and outlook is genuine, and readers will enjoy strong secondary characters as well as some heartfelt humor in this unexpected love story.--Nancy R.E. O'Brien
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
Laughter is the best medicine, Dart (Beaches) wants us to believe, and she makes her case in a risky, wrenching story with a curious flaw. Though the novel offers endless punning and stand-up material, it's rarely funny, and even with the comic spotlight on the so-unlikely-it's-inevitable romance between two Emmy-level TV comedy writers, Lily Benjamin and Charlie Roth, neither their initial antagonism nor eventual alliance makes for laughs. And given the plot, readers do need those healing peals. In the opening pages, single mother Lily's teenage son, Bryan, is shot; yesterday a promising tennis star, he now faces life as a paraplegic. Lily's fianc?, Mark Freeman, a handsome, kind, terminally unimaginative cardiologist (he gives her heart-shape presents and uses song lyrics to speak his own heart), wants Bryan and Lily to feel the tragedy, mourn their loss, adjust hopes downward. But then there is Charlie, known in the TV industry as the God of Jokes. Crippled in infancy, he was encouraged by his parents to use a no-holds-barred humor as his weapon against prejudice and self-doubt. Charlie preaches a medicine of ruthless humor, toughness and, above all else, gratitudeAfor the cripple, in his view, is freed from the illusion of physical perfection and lives truer to his soul. This main theme is echoed in the subplot, in which Lily's chubby lesbian sister confronts the siblings' judgmental, snobby mother. Other minor characters, like the ensemble of sitcom-writing co-workers, are burdened with a nearly unbearable comic banter attempting an outr? irreverence. Though her formula is decidedly Hollywood, Dart's message, that people aren't what they look like, is sincere; her book takes serious and heartfelt looks at the bigotries of able-bodied folk and the realities of the disabled.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
