Shopgirl by Steve Martin (audiobook)

Shopgirl - Steve Martin

I read and really enjoyed Martin's book "The Pleasure of my Company" a few years ago. It was quirky and sweet and I found it very funny in parts. I was hoping for more of the same with Shopgirl when I stumbled across the unabridged audio but for some reason it's not working for me.

 

At all.

 

I'm finding myself bored and annoyed. It's about a 28 year old woman who works in a shop selling "gloves no one wants to buy" (I guess that's a job?) and lives like a newly graduated college student. She's lonely and shy and wants to meet a man she'll fall head over heels for. Meanwhile she dates Jeremy, a slacker who doesn't seem to ring any of her bells, and now there's a 50ish divorced millionaire entering the picture. Ugh. On both counts.

 

I'm not finding this charming or quirky or even slightly interesting and may give it up very soon. Instead I'm finding it all rather shallow and too focused on clothes and expensive meals and endless, unfunny descriptions of things I just don't give two craps about. The characterization is incredibly flat. Steve Martin's reading of the words is very disappointing. I guess over the past few years of steadily reading professionally narrator works I've been spoiled. Martin reads the words but adds no life to them. All of the characters have the same voice. The whole tone of the book so far been rather dreary when I was hoping for a laugh.

 

Damn, looks like I just talked myself into another DNF.