It was one of those books stacked neatly in the corner which wasn’t in the bookstore’s bestseller’s shelf but merited a space in the Features corner. It had an interesting blurb and featured one technology-conversant character thus sparking my initial interest. After all, I wasn’t one who frequently bought a lot of romance novels. Well, save for those stamped with the name Nicholas Sparks. Now even with those I’ve had a couple of mishits but I figured my basket had one too many thrillers thus the decision to purchase. And when I felt I needed a break from all the gore and depression which comes with George R.R. Martin killing off a lot of characters, I jumped to Rainbow Rowell’s “Attachments.” By the end of 300-plus pages, I realized it was indeed one good jump with the guilty pleasure frills on the edges.
Rowell’s debut novel is set in 1999, right at the cusp of the new millennium. Lincoln works in the IT department of a local newspaper company in Nebraska. His job is to screen emails which get flagged in the company’s system for violating a policy against using office email to send personal messages. Perhaps to make him more dispassionate, Lincoln works during the graveyard shift in a cold office isolated from the rest of the newsroom. He does send some notices to certain employees but is hooked to a series of email exchanges between Jennifer, a copy editor, and Beth, an entertainment writer, that he never gets down to enforcing the rules when their emails are concerned. Even if he has never seen or met them, Lincoln eventually grows to know both women through their emails since they bare a lot of personal details in their messages and he begins to form an attachment to the pair, especially to one of them.
Lincoln and the book’s reader are rightfully engaged by the series of completely hilarious emails exchanged between Jennifer and Beth. Both write with huge chunks of wit, a healthy dose of tart and an overload of humor that snickers are always a guarantee. Reading through the pages is akin to a fun kind of voyeurism wherein one can see the deep friendship between two women who share a lot of seemingly shallow stories which may seem both senseless and sensible. They discuss a myriad of things - family, grammar, stalking, movies, men, whether a fetus has an umbilical cord at six weeks, breakfast vis-a-vis infertile tigers, alter-egos and, of course, Colin Firth.
As Jennifer and Beth utilize their electronic attachments to lament about personal attachments to their families, parents and to their men, Lincoln also struggles with his own set - a dissatisfaction with how his life and career are turning out despite having multiple degrees, the fact that he still lived with his mother, how his social life was mostly confined to weekly Dungeons and Dragons games with college friends and the struggle with getting over a girl he cannot quite forget. Jennifer and Beth’s constant banter about what they have to hold on to and what they have to let go provide the perfect backdrop for Lincoln’s evaluation of what he should keep and what he should change. Christine, a friend of Lincoln, provides the perfect antidote to Lincoln’s dismissal that the new year is just like an odometer turning. “It’s a chance to wake up new,” she says and that sets the stage for Lincoln as he decides to do something different with his life even as he struggles that the answer probably is not to “move out” but to “ease out.”
The book doesn’t provoke thoughts as deep as the earth’s core or parade brooding, psychologically stilted characters but it does give the occasional comforting nudge about things any person may have gone through or could be currently facing. It is the familiarity with the characters and their daily quandaries - all delightfully wrapped in Rowell’s very entertaining prose - which makes “Attachments” very difficult to put down. Reading especially through Jennifer and Beth’s repartee made me recall similar, equally hilarious verbal tussles with my closest friends. It doesn’t help that the characters are charmingly endearing or endearingly charming, however way you want to see it. Lincoln is an easy favorite. He is so Star Wars/Lord of the Rings geeky I find him completely adorable. Jennifer is all cynicism and pessimism but she undergoes a huge character transformation without the routine sappiness. Chris, Beth’s boyfriend, is so sullen, withdrawn and rebellious and yet still quite engaging. Beth is so easy to love because she is just like high school at any age - seemingly decisive, oftentimes misunderstood and eternally hopeful. In the book, she talks in terms of films she has seen and favorite MTVs that in the middle of reading, any 80s or 90s kid would most likely blurt out “Oh yeah, I know that!” What I liked best about her (and laughed most heartily at) was her verbalization of something I had long been puzzled with: why a lot of dresses do not come with sleeves anymore for those who want to cover their arms when, according to her, “the whole point of clothing is to hide your shame” which she supports with a verse from Genesis.
It has become quite difficult to write about a book I thoroughly enjoyed while censoring myself lest I give away too much. But I could not help but agree with what one of my favorite writers, Jodi Picoult, said about the book: “If Attachments were an email, I’d be forwarding it to my entire list of contacts.” Which is exactly why I’ve successfully convinced my best friend to drop by our house tomorrow to pick it up after work so she can give it a try herself.
