jo.com's Full Review: Danielle Steel - Dating Game
I am reviewing Dating Game by Danielle Steel. This is her newest book.
I have admitted to reading Danielle Steel. Without apologizing for it or making excuses I find her stories for the most part totally mindless. They are books I can read while watching television or even while the kids in school are having their silent reading time. There is no concentration needed. One of the reasons for that is her style of repetition. When I first started reading her, it drove me crazy. I felt as if I could skip pages and not miss anything. I have become so used to it that I know when I pick up her books this is what I will find.
Dating Game is a little different from many of her other books. I’ve read 95% of them. In Dating Game, Steel manages to repeat herself a little less. She certainly repeats herself but I found that rather than the exact same words, the ideas were put a little differently. If you have never read Steel, you’d find something like this, "It seemed only minutes before that she was changing diapers and carpooling....” Two pages later we read, “She’s been baking cookies and driving carpools for too long.” You’ll read this many times throughout the book and I always feel that if Danielle Steel didn’t repeat herself she wouldn’t have enough material for a book.
Dating Game also veers a bit form her usual in her attempt at humor. That isn’t to say that there has never been an attempt at humor, but for the most part I find Steel’s books dramatic and serious rather than funny. I found myself laughing at least twice during this book. This is a rare occurrence for me with her books. On one date as her date came staggering in, the main character’s friend states, “He has a problem with his ears. It affects his balance. He’s a really great guy.” As he took off his cowboy hat, the main character couldn’t help but notice 10 years' worth of clay under his nails.
So we have slightly different Danielle Steel in Dating Game.
The characters:
~Paris Armstrong is an extremely bright, 47 year old, attractive woman with an MBA, two children and a seemingly happy marriage.
~Peter Armstrong is Paris’ husband, a successful lawyer, 51 yeard old, who shocked Paris by telling her he was leaving her to marry his co-worker 20 years younger than he.
~Meg and Wim are Paris and Peter’s children. One is starting college; the other one graduated and lives on the other side of the country. They are wonderful young adults who are supportive of their mom and successful themselves.
~Bix Mason is Paris’ boss. He is a wise, sensitive man who becomes Paris’ best friend.
The plot:
Of course I am not going to give the plot away. I will tell you that during the first six chapters I had to keep checking the date of the book to make sure I hadn’t read it before. The first six chapters are every book you have ever read about the happily married couple who is no longer happily married and the havoc it wreaks on the family. In fact, I just finished an excellent book called Up Island by Anne Rivers Siddons. This is way above the skills of Danielle Steele and the story is different. However, the beginning of The Dating Game reads so similarly that I wondered how she could get away with it. Of course it reads like many books you have read including the stories in self-help books.
It gets interesting and fun to read as we go on Paris’ dating escapades with her. We live with her through her sadness and joys and the struggle to find herself. We live through her ups and downs, the men and women she meets and befriends and the twist of fate when her daughter marries while Paris is dating a younger man.
My final thoughts:
I am very sensitive. I do truly cry during Hallmark commercials. This book, like most of Steel’s books, is predictable so I don’t think I am ruining the story by telling you that the happy ever after ending left me in tears. They weren’t bad tears. They were tears of being able to empathize, perhaps more so because I was divorced as well. I do think whether you are married or not, divorced, single, straight or gay, if you like Danielle Steel, you will enjoy Dating Game. I liked it more than I have liked her last several books.
Married for 25 years, Paris Armstrong thinks she has it all--two wonderful children, a beautiful house, and a husband she adores. However, Paris soon ...More at Alibris
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