KatieMc

Landline is about a couple with two kids and a 14 year teetering marriage at a crossroads during the suckiest time of year, Christmas.     Georgie and Neal have two adorable daughters.   Neal stays home and cares for the daughters while Georgie is a TV comedy writer.  A potentially big break forces Georgie to stay behind in LA while Neal takes the girls back home to Nebraska for Christmas.  (BTW, Rainbow Rowell loves Nebraska).    Physical distance, time zones, and those damned cell phones are not doing anything to help Georgie and Neal in this trying time.

While this sounds like a setup for a cookie cutter career versus relationship battle, it really becomes a heartwarming reflective journey aided by a magical fucking phone.  The phone in question, a rotary landline, connects Georgie to her then-boyfriend Neal from 17 years ago.  Yes, there is a telecommunications themed time travel premise.   For those who are suffering from Outlander fatigue, the time travel is refreshingly free of forced marriages, rapes, and beatings. 

I commend Rainbow Rowell on her ability to write hip contemporary characters, making them extremely relatable.  Georgie is cool, in fact, her name is Georgie McCool and she is a TV comedy writer.   This type of character setup has the potential to be pretentious, but instead, I liked her.  I rooted for her, and I wanted what was best for her.    

I did notice a continuity error in the audiobook, and I would be curious if the same error appears in print.  In one of the last chapters, she mentions 1988 twice as the year that Neal proposed marriage to her.    A few pages later, that same year was referred to correctly as 1998 (2013 – 17). 

Lastly, Rainbow Rowell does a nice job depicting the LA/Valley setting.  A couple of items worth noting:

1) Versailles, a Cuban restaurant, has incredible garlic chicken.

2) The ‘snow’ at Disneyland is actually soap.