The Rosie Project, debut novel from Australian writer Graeme Simsion, is a feel good, rom-com, page turner ideal as a lighter read after the heavier tomes of the award season. What the novel lacks in intellectual depth is made up with a fast paced narrative that romps through common dating misconceptions and the anxiety around meeting 'the One'.
The story features Don Tillman, a 39 year old geneticist, who devises a 16 page questionnaire which he believes will help him find the perfect wife. Don knows exactly the type of woman he wants to avoid settling down with and, when he meets Rosie "the World's most incompatible woman", his approach is initially validated.
Don's life is highly systematic, ordered and meticulous as is his approach to finding a life partner. This is another novel with the protagonist somewhere on the Asperger's scale but, as with The Shock of the Fall, the work is heart-warming, humorous and feel good - i.e. destined to fly of the shelves in late austerity Britain!
The novel is more screen play than literature and will, no doubt, make the transfer to the big screen in due course. Will it make more than standard popcorn rom-com fare? - Yes it just might thanks to the Don's unique academic nerd meets chivalrous romantic turn.
The publishers, Penguin, have had some fun trying to make this an 'event' novel with its positioning as the novel of 2014. Whilst the inclusion of Don's questionnaire as an appendix is irresistibly witty, the cocktail menu and party inspiration that follows is less tongue in cheek and more try hard!
An easy read but ultimately a little too 'made for Hollywood'.
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