In this entertaining chick-lit confessional, Connie Lukey chronicles a year in the life of a young Canadian woman determined to find love and happiness by her 40th birthday.
Jane Parker has just turned 39. Smart and practical, she surrenders an intended fashion career to become a CPA, because no one’s ever heard of “a starving accountant.” She’s a proud, independent woman of the ’90s, but with a ticking biological clock, she feels she’ll somehow always be Jane, “The One Who Never Got Married.”
Then, a self-help book from her younger, married sister about finding your soulmate in under a year suddenly puts Jane on a mission. With the help of family, friends, co-workers, and her dachshund “Wanker,” Lukey’s fictional heroine navigates the dating minefields.
In first-person narrative, Jane reveals connections made at the local Barking Frog bar, an attraction to her married guitar teacher, and get-togethers with the 55-plus set (though she considers this age group problematic regarding her desire to start a family). Disappointed by local dating, she eventually realizes she must search beyond the local dating pool and consider personal ads and Internet options. When a sudden, unexpected event places Jane in harm’s way, her quest for love takes on a whole new perspective.
Chapter segues between present and past offer insight into Jane’s earlier heartbreaks and pique interest for later revelations. Some material may seem dated by today’s standards (e.g. a boss who lectures his female employees on family planning so as not to interrupt tax season) and dry accounting jargon occasionally interrupts the book’s overall fluidity. Also, readers will encounter a few clichés. But the book’s fun and wit —from comparisons of over- and under-endowed men to business clients unable to claim tax refunds because they’ve been declared dead —overshadows such flaws.
An engaging entry into a popular literary genre, Love Ledgers is reminiscent of Bridget Jones’s Diary, and Sex and the City. Believable and spirited, Lukey’s novel delivers an enjoyable read.
