[.ca] The Ladies' Man (ISBN 037570731X)

From Amazon.com:
Soon after Nash Harvey, incurable womanizer and failing jingle composer, arrives at the Boston home of the Dobbin sisters, he is struck with a casserole dish. This isn't all that surprising, considering that Nash, onetime fiancé of Adele Dobbin, disappeared on the night of their engagement party, 30 years ago. Fresh from a failed romance with a Californian reflexologist, Nash brings chaos to the three sisters, all of whom has done the best to settle into spinsterhood. Unintentionally, he leads everyone he meets to a truer knowledge of him- or herself, and the possibilities of a brighter future. Five distinct but masterfully interwoven tales of the heart spin around the central, hilariously desperate mission of Nash, a man seeking to escape the inescapable. Lipman writes with the wry authority of a latter-day Jane Austen or Henry James. Her work ripples with startling segues into the perversities of male-female relationships. Yet for all this insight, her characters are drawn with companionable warmth. This is not a book about the bold and the beautiful. Her cast inhabits a twilight of TV dinners, graying hair, and disastrous dates, yet they never lose their hope or their capacity for love. A gourmet casserole of a book--drama, humor, and understanding in equally generous portions. --Matthew Baylis

Very disappointing:
I picked up this book drawn to it by its cover and reviews. There was absolutely nothing noteworthy about it. The characters were ridiculous. I cannot understand how anyone could call this book charming or witty. The women who fall for the title character are unbelievably dense. Even more unbelievable is the way in which, throughout the book, characters allow Nash to insinuate himself into their lives. I found this book dull and a waste of valuable reading time.

Ultimately disappointing.:
This novel is amusing enough but ultimately unsatisfying. The characters, who are all in great need of making fundamental life changes, do not change at all, or else they change so slowly that the novel ends before their fates become clear. I ended up wanting more of some characters, particularly the three sisters that form the centerpiece of the novel, and less of others, particularly the "ladies' man's" girlfriend stranded back in California. The whole book felt a little askew, trying to say something but not quite succeeding. Disappointing.

Ladies Man At Bay:
Elinor Lipman is concerned with second chances. In her previous romance, The Way Men Act, she described the slow and accidental re-union of a divorcee with the high school flame she never wed. In The Ladies' Man she puts this basic question of whether it's possible to go back in a more complicated frame. Harvey Nash, the professional romancer of the title, follows the trade of commercial jingles composer and returns to Boston fleeing his West coast live-in lover, Dina, whose modeling career has given way to a commercial practice massaging feet. The woman he abandoned, failing to turn up to their engagement party thirty years earlier, is Adelle Dobbin, also encumbered - by two sisters, Lois and Kathleen, both also single. It is Lipman's endeavour to explore not only the damage which Harvey's breach of faith did to the marriageability of all three, but also how his re-appearance in their lives unexpectedly jarrs them back into motion, a bowling ball among the cob-webbed skittles. Adelle fundraises for non commercial TV, Lois (the middle one) works for the Employment Office and Kathleen owns a lingerie boutique whose doorman, Lorenz, she flirts with and finally dates in the flurry of Harvey's return. (He arrives at midnight, flirts with all three in turn, and moves Kathleen to break a casserole over his head.) The doorman's building also contains Cynthia John, a financial consultant Harvey seduces on the plane East, who throws a music recital to show him off (a masterful scene of music snobs volte facing into success worshipping applause at Harvey's one ubiquitous coffee ad refrain). The initial charm and inexplicability of Harvey's relentless boyish seduction is gradually stripped away by Lipman's gaze - he emptied Dina's bank account on the way from LA but calls her to forward the residual payment cheques which are his only income. The scene of Nash Harvey (his professionally reversed name) inspecting the dilapidated parental home he first left Boston to flee, reduced to staying there rent free if he is to stay at all, is quietly fierce, as is the scene of Adelle breaking down in the changing room of her sister's shop: "Dell, are you alright?" "No," she says softly. But these scenes are always harnessed to comedy, as Harvey's vengeful ex Cynthia walks into the store, as Adelle's remembered one sexual encounter was with a randy academic whose pedagogic urge leads him to view his member as a teaching aide. These scenes are ruefully funny, a bitter undercurrent to the frothy shake of Lipman's style, making her books a smooth but satisfying brew. Lipman's gems in this book are the minor characters: Lorenz the doorman's traditional father who thinks Kathleen is too good to sleep around with and won't vacate the apartment, Adelle's shy station boss admirer Marty whose sexual harassment paranoia and self-doubts she deftly hits, the boyish deputy Sherrif brother Richard Dobbin, whose reflexive picking up on waitresses is a less exploitative counterpart to Harvey, part of Lipman's ongoing project shaking her head at men's odd ways. Her one failure is Byron Sprock, the passing playwright Dina conjugates with, whose glibness is too close to Harvey's with no grain of depth, perhaps why Dina wants to get her ladies' man returned. The exquisite handling of the plot's spinning plates never let you feel much will ever fall out of hand, but Lipman's acid eye won't let you think she's been too kind or glib while sending Harvey on his way. Stern in its judgements but kind to its readers and characters, it is a wise and easy book to read.

Funny and intelligent:
Lipman is a charming and funny writer who is full of wit and verbal sparkle. From its magnetic first sentence to its ingenious climax, this is a superbly entertaining book. The Dobbin sisters, attractive red-headed spinsters Adele, Lois and Kathleen, live together in relative harmony until Adele's ex-fiance, the incorrigible, debonair and pathologically unreliable Nash Harvey, makes a sudden reappearance on their doorstep. But Nash soon finds out that scorned women do not make gracious hostesses. Yet the re-appearance of Nash Harvey, who deserted Adele Dobbin 30 years ago on the evening of their engagement party, throws the lives of the Dobbin sisters into disarray. Not only is Adele confused and upset, Lois has always had a crush on Nash, and now skittishly dyes her hair blonde. My only concern with The Ladies' Man was that the narrative was in present tense. This took some adjusting to, and distracted me from the story too often. However, don't let that put you off, because The Ladies' Man is still a delightful novel for when you are in the mood for something light-hearted and cheerful.

A fun and readable book...:
This is only the 2nd book I've read by Elinor Lipman, but it certainly won't be the last. This one is even better than the other one I read, The Inn at Lake Devine. It is definitely funnier and kept me turning pages. The Ladies' Man is set in Boston and tells the story of the three Dobbins sisters, Adele, Lois and Kathleen, all set in spinsterhood, and Nash Harvey, the man who dumped Adele on the night of their engagement party 30 years before. It seems Nash can't move forward in his life (relationship or otherwise) without first mending ways with Adele. So he leaves his girlfriend in California, flies to Boston (and of course, makes a date with Cynthia, his plane-mate), and shows up on Adele's doorstop out of the clear blue. Thing is, Adele is not willing to forgive him. Regardless, Nash's stay in Boston has an effect on her as well as her sisters and brother, Richard, in different and funny ways. And of course, Nash's "Ladies' Man" ways are evident from the very first page. I really enjoyed this book. It was a simple story, but very interesting and fun to see what would happen next. I recommend The Ladies' Man as a quick, light read and one that will no doubt entertain readers 100 percent. Will be reading more by Elinor, guaranteed!