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Review: Landline by Rainbow Rowell

Title: Landline
Author: Rainbow Rowell
Year Published: 2014

Genre: Adult fiction (romance)
Pages: 308
Rating: 4 out of 5

Location (my 2015 Google Reading map)USA (CA)

FTC Disclosure: I bought this book with my own money

Summary (from the inside flap of the book):
 As far as time machines go, a magic telephone is pretty useless. TV writer Georgie McCool can't actually visit the past--all she can do is call it, and hope it picks up. And hope he picks up.

Because once Georgie realizes she has a magic phone that calls into the past, all she wants to do is make things right with her husband, Neal. Maybe she can fix the things in their past that seem unfixable in the present. Maybe this stupid phone is giving he ra chance to start over.... Does Georgie want to start over?

Review: Rainbow Rowell is such a good author! I have enjoyed the other three books of hers that I've read: Fangirl; Eleanor and Park; and Attachments and this book did not disappoint. All of her books are funny, poignant, and quick reads. I find I read them with a smile on my face and I nod my head, like I'm agreeing with her and understanding where the characters are coming from.

Landline is a bit different from the other three that I've read in that there really isn't a whole lot of plot to it. There isn't some major disaster that happens, or an event that it is all building up to; instead it is character-driven. Through the landline phone calls the reader gets to know Georgie and Paul and to understand their relationship. And it isn't as if their relationship is something special. Neither one has a disease, neither one is an addict, neither one has an affair. They just are. They are like so many other couples who fall in love and stay together and it isn't all perfect. They find themselves adults with kids and jobs and almost wonder how they got there.

With the time travel phone Georgie is able to see how she and Paul started out, the mistakes she's made, and how she can be better. Better at being a professional writer, better at being a mom, better at being a wife. Will she be better? Who knows. But at least she is aware of it as the book ends. 

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