ROMANTIC COMEDY by Curtis Sittenfeld

 Sally Milz, our first-person narrator, writes sketches for a live TV comedy show that sounds exactly like SNL.  When the week’s host/musical guest Noah Brewster asks her to help him revise a sketch of his own, Sally begins to wonder if someone as hot and famous could be interested in an average-looking woman like herself.  Noah shows signs of being attracted to Sally, but she sabotages the moment at the after-party.  Then Covid changes everyone’s lives, including theirs, and they reconnect by email.  Their email exchange runs a solid 70 pages in the middle of the book, but this section was my favorite part.  Not only is it snappy and clever, but it allows Sally and Noah to expose their vulnerabilities more candidly than they would have been inclined to in person.  My second favorite part is the beginning section, which details how an SNL-type TV show operates.  The third section is more about how or if this relationship is going to work.  Noah seems to hold all the cards here with his good looks and L.A. mansion, not to mention his kind and respectful demeanor; he exudes tenderness.  However, Sally is not an easy sell, simply because she cannot quite believe that this hot guy would be more interested in her mind than her body.  The overall best feature of this book is, of course, the superb prose of Curtis Sittenfeld, including some insightful statements about life in general that prove she knows something about that as well.  Here’s an exchange from page 259 that impressed me with its wisdom:

He laughed.  “There’s a compliment I’ve wanted to give you, but I’m not sure I’ve figured out how to say it in a way that doesn’t make me sound self-centered.”

              “Everyone is self-centered,” I said.  “Go for it.”