Reviews

The Man of My Dreams by Curtis Sittenfeld

neenthebean17's review against another edition

2.0

Yuck. Hannah is such a boring, pitiable main character. Literally nothing interesting or notable happens to her until the end of the book. Each vignette about her life ends with her making a foolish, selfish mistake, and seemingly not learning from it. She's also so disgustingly stereotypical in her younger years. Definitely do not recommend this book.

catherine_louise's review against another edition

5.0

I feel like Curtis Sittenfeld climbed into my head, took all my thoughts and neuroses, and wrote them on the page a million times better than I ever could. I have never related to a book as deeply and intensely as I do this one.

tonyriver's review against another edition

4.0

Hannah is a great character. She seems to have a challenging time getting to be comfortable with her life and reams. I guess that is in part what makes her so relate all. Not always the nicest person in the room - she can be pretty honest - but always interesting and decent.

I enjoyed following her for a decade and a bit and Sittenfeld is a great writer. While not for a light read it is Recommended.

tschonfeld's review against another edition

2.0

This was ok; not great - it came off as depressing rather than revelatory, but maybe that's because I identified a wee bit too much with Hannah. Regardless, I can't really recommend it; this was no Prep.

kymme's review against another edition

4.0

This book didn't grab me right away, maybe because I wasn't that fascinated by Hannah at age 14, but as the book progresses and she ages, I did find her interesting, so much so that I read the whole book in under 24 hours. The family dynamics are believable and I enjoyed that Hannah had both a sister and a female cousin with whom she had complicated, but overall good, relationships with. This is a coming of age story that is, on the surface, about "getting a boyfriend," but it's far from cliched and it's quite nuanced in terms of other kinds of relationships, too.

dmurphy's review against another edition

2.0

I loved Prep and American Wife but this just didn't capture my attention and I just kept reason because of the love I had for the previous books.

andintothetrees's review

4.0

Before I begin, I’d like to confess that until I googled for an image to accompany this review I had no idea Curtis Sittenfeld is a woman (I have previously only come across men with that first name, maybe that’s just a British thing though). Not that the gender of the author matters, but it does rather negate the point I was planning to make about a male author having written a very convincing female lead character. Anyway, the cliché “don’t judge a book by its cover” is well known, but in this case I think “don’t judge a book by its title” is equally well placed. When my friend Ingrid recommended Curtis’ books to me I decided to see what the library had available and I must admit I felt embarrassed to check out a book with such a cheesy title (I would rather have checked out her first novel, Prep, but the only copy was a giant hardback that would have been difficult to carry around). This was no feather-light “chick lit” novel however, despite the impression its name may give.

... [Read the rest of my review here: https://whathannahread.wordpress.com/2011/12/11/the-man-of-my-dreams-by-curtis-sittenfeld/]

reachant's review against another edition

3.0

I haven't read PREP but I have read AMERICAN WIFE and this one just doesn't stack up! But it did draw me in towards the end. A lot of the time I just felt it wasn't going anywhere.

moosetash's review against another edition

slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

toesinthesand's review against another edition

3.0

I liked Sisterland better. this was good but the main character occasionally annoyed me with her tendency to blurt out every thought that entered her head, even if it was inappropriate.