Elenor can do everything herself! She is fine living an isolated life, talking to Mummy on Wednesday nights. She has an extensive vocabulary, says what she means and is scarred on the side of her face from a fire but she's fine with it or are there more scars on her heart keeping her isolated.An unlikely friendship starts with her new co-worker Raymond after they save a man in the streets. This little group start a friendship that could save Elenor even though she doesn't want or realize that she needs friends. Highly recommend! I could definitely see this book becoming a classic. We should never judge people based on just the outside.

What a great title. The central idea of the story is Eleanor’s growth from not fine at all to nearly fine—or close enough so the story ends well because we readers see that path out ahead of her. We leave Raymond, a perfect foil to Eleanor’s constricted persona, as a possibility, not a certainty. Nice … so un-cliché.Speaking of cliché, it would have been so easy to drench this story in it. Honeyman manages to get through it without cliché and in first person. Like the old story of the gifted athlete who was asked how he made love and responded, “Standing up … in a hammock.”Eleanor is an engaging character from the first page, pathetic in her many strictures at first. But she's so bright and funny without realizing it, we like her anyway. We watch the strictures strain and break as the story moves along. She’s bottled up in her preconceptions through the first half of the book. If Honeyman had pushed it just a little further, Eleanor would have become a repeating inanity. But at Sammy’s funeral, finally, she felt terrible for Sammy and his family … “Tears came, and the more I tried to fight them, the more they came.” To me, that initiated Eleanor’s growth.Also, I’m a sucker for good writing. How in-character of Eleanor to describe Donald Trump’s favorite filet o’ fish as a “square of indeterminate white fish, which was coated in bread crumbs and deep fried and then inserted between an overly sweet bread bun, accompanied, bizarrely, by a processed cheese slice, a limp lettuce leaf and some tangy white slime which bordered o obscenity.” Honeyman mines high dudgeon for great humor again and again.Writing in first person has become popular in the last decade, possibly in keeping with people's intense interest in their own inner workings. First person is difficult to do well because all the information the reader gets is from the protagonist. There is no way to vector in on a situation from multiple points of view. Therefore, stress on the protagonist. Honeyman turns the disadvantage on its head by writing such a compelling main character that we never get tired of seeing the world through her eyes. In the first half of the book, Eleanor manages to let the reader know just how distorted her view of the world is but succeeds in making the reader understand that she is oblivious. High art, indeed.Jaded a reader as I am, I have not had fiction force me to stay awake well beyond midnight in more than a year. I finished Eleanor at 2:30 am.

This is a book club review, with very little summary of the book itself. Our book club read this book as our February book club. Our book club rates books on readability, likability, quality, and of course, discussion merit. Eleanor Oliphant ended up being in our top favorite book club reads of all time, hence the five star rating.Eleanor Oliphant is a dark comedy about a woman's journey into finding her path, to opening up, and to facing her emotions/head/past. It's difficult to give a summary of this book that does not include spoilers, which I believe could take away from the beauty of this book. However, due to the dark nature of this book, there may be triggers here for some readers (please see very bottom note with spoiler triggers).As a book club read, this book rated very high, an 8 of out 10, because of the amount of discussion that came from it. We were truly invested in this discussion - members shed tears, laughed, hugged... it was a wonderful book to discuss. We talked for hours and hours, and eventually ran out of time. We rarely have so much discussion with books that is so deep and meaningful. And everyone agreed that the book was likable despite the dark subject matter. The book is so incredibly funny and sweet, that it makes the hard topics just a bit easier. As far as quality, the book is far from flawless. Individual ratings were the book in general were about a 6, so a bit lower. But as far as a book club selection, the book was a great deal of fun and very worthy of a group discussion.The book takes place in Scotland, which made for a fun and lively theme, and a Scottish potluck. This book, surprisingly, has a LOT of food mentions, so there was plenty of recipes to select from. Everyone enjoyed eating the foods that Eleanor and the other characters mention in the book.Overall, this book is recommended for book clubs!***SPOILER TRIGGER WARNINGS*** I so often get asked for triggers, I just share these for book club reviews now. After all, what may be fine for the individual reader is not always great in a book club/group discussion. But, of course, triggers are also spoilers, so please do not read on if you do not want that. I will also add the disclaimer that none of these triggers were an issue for our book club, and no one had any problems with the subject matter. We include these strictly as a warning for other book clubs. Topics included: Childhood abuse and trauma, murder, death, suicide topics, alcoholism, and mental health issues.

What a beautifully written book about Miss Eleanor Oliphant There are lessons here about the people we walk by everyday who are suffering in some fashion. It's easy to pass them off like the voice in Eleanor's head would have her do. She surprises herself and us as well when she not only survives her childhood, but becomes a "just fine" adult. I was sad to say goodbye to her when the book ended and will definitely look for more from Gail Honeyman.

I don’t think I liked this as much as a lot of others. It was just ok in my opinion. I wasn’t really a fan of the Eleanor character, she irritated me and I found it hard to read at first. I am glad I finished the book though. I did enjoy the growth the character made throughout the book and the relationship that developed throughout the book. I don’t think it was worth $12 but if the price drops, I’d recommend it, it’s an ok read.