You Don't Love This Man: A Novel

Interesting Look at Midlife

Paul, a middle aged manager of the bank he's worked at since college, is at a crossroads and it's the day before his only daughter's wedding. His marriage to Miranda's mother Sandra has ended in divorce and Miranda is planning to marry Grant, a successful business man who has been Paul's friend since before Miranda was even conceived. He doesn't feel like an equal part of his daughter's life and isn't convinced that she should marry Grant at all. As he's sitting at his ex-wife's kitchen table feeling like a useless accessory, he finds out that his bank has been robbed and his daughter is missing. Paul feels obligated to check in on work, but is worried about his daughter. He agrees to Sharon's request to check on her. From there, his day unfolds in snatches of memories of the past and bouts of coming to terms with his current reality. In some ways I found Paul to be a kindred spirit. There is one scene where he's thinking about one thing while he's working and he eventually becomes unsure of where his thoughts end and his memories of what he was doing at work begin. I can very much see myself in that situation. There are definitely times when my imagination becomes very active and things start to blend and bleed into each other. While I've never had personal experience with bank robberies, I could very easily understand Paul's growing cynicism about what is important on the day of his daughter's wedding. All along Paul's story there were chuckles of recognition from me. I very much enjoyed Paul's sense of humor, even when under the most stress during that fateful day. With the exception of Paul and Catherine, his subordinate at the bank, I can't really say that I liked the rest of the characters in You Don't Love This Man that much. I truly didn't understand how Sandra became the mother she did during Miranda's teen years. Grant was never anything more than a charming but thoroughly self-centered man. His interest in Paul's appearance was more to make him an acce...