Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine

An isolated young woman is liberated from a sad, damaged past via the unexpected kindness and caring of new friends.

Thirty-year-old Eleanor Oliphant is a creature of habit who keeps to herself. Plagued with a facial scar and often donning white gloves to conceal flares of psoriasis, the bright, articulate yet lowly office worker lives alone in a small Glasgow flat. She has managed to survive and circumvent the horrors of her early life--including stints in foster care--by taking comfort in books, doing crossword puzzles, watching the BBC, having a weekly chat with her cruel and demeaning "Mummy" and indulging in vodka on a regular basis.

When Eleanor develops a crush--from afar--on a singer in a local rock band, she embarks on a self-improvement crusade that includes hilarious firsts in bikini waxing, manicures and becoming techno-literate in computers and smartphones. Along the way of her transformation, she crosses paths with warmhearted Raymond, who works in the IT department of her company. As the two are leaving the office one day, they stop to help an elderly man who has collapsed in the street. This simple act upends Eleanor's life in enlightening and challenging ways.

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine, Gail Honeyman's intriguing, hopeful first novel, explores the power of kindness and how unexpected friendships can liberate lives. Eleanor's lovable, eccentric and original narrative voice is entrancing. It draws readers fully into her damaged, unconventional psyche as she is forced to deal with a deeply repressed past and come to grips with who she is, and who she'd like to be.

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman

Pamela Dorman Books/Viking, $26.00 Hardcover, 9780735220683, 336 pages

Publication Date: May 9, 2017

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NOTE: This review is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (June 9, 2017), link HERE