Eat, Pray, Die

Eat, Pray, Die by Chelsea Field

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Chelsea Field is obviously a massive fan of Janet Evanovich‘s Stephanie Plum series, but she has managed to find a new twist on this tired, tired theme, by having her heroine Isabel be a poison taster for the rich & famous. There is (of course) a Joe to rescue Izzy from her stupider mistakes & I think I have picked out this book’s Ranger.Field strays into Kinsey territory with the friendly older neighbor, but the personality is more like my favourite Evanovich creation, Grandma Mazur.

Isabel has a bright & quirky personality, but although Field is an Australian herself, Isabel doesn’t seem particularly Australian – other than her longing to find a decent cup of coffee in Los Angeles. Possibly Ms Field’s editors & beta readers have urged her to remove every bit of Aussie slang from her vocabulary, but I think that is a pity. A writer can chase the American market too hard. Saying that, I like this series spoof literary titles & clever jacket branding. The constant book cover changing of some new authors just makes me crazy!

The book itself did have a couple of patches where the pace slowed & the whole story was highly improbable. I enjoyed, partly because I’ve had a run of dull, turgid books & partly because I switched my brain off and just had fun!

But if you want a decent coffee – pfft! New Zealand coffee & cafes are way superior to any I have encountered in Australia.