One Day

One Day
By David Nicholls
Vintage Books, 2010. 437 pgs. Fiction

Dexter and Emma meet on graduation day in Edinburgh and share the night together, but in an unconventional way. Em and Dex’s friendship continues for the next twenty years, and the reader sees how it evolves, or doesn’t evolve, along with their lives each year on the same date they met. As they live their mostly unsatisfying lives, their relationship is the one thing that centers them.

I cannot believe I actually finished this book. Intrigued initially by the premise, I kept reading because I wanted to know what eventually happens to their relationship. That’s the only thing that kept me going though. For most of the book, Dex is a self-absorbed twit who doesn’t really change, but continues his fast living with women, drugs, and such. Em is better, at least realizing that she is not happy in various situations and changing that, but she can be whiny as well. The will-they or won't-they gimmick quickly tires. Fans of off-beat love stories might appreciate this, but readers who appreciate character development will be put off by it. Those readers who like their books clean, or even somewhat clean, will want to keep away from this one.

MN