Until the Real Thing Comes Along

Rating:
Summary: A near hit....
Review: I've not read any of Elizabeth Berg's other books, although I want to - her writing draws you in to the characters, her descriptions and dialogues are excellent. This story was well written, mildly entertaining (I read it all the way through), but unfulfilling.

A few chapters into the book, though I still wanted to keep on reading, I wondered if this was the book the latest Madonna movie was based on - girl wants baby, girl has baby by gay best friend, everyone lives happily ever after.

This book isn't that story - there's a bit more. Patty's clock may be ticking, but not necessarily for a baby. She thinks it might be for Ethan, but she seems to be searching for some meaning in her life, without knowing where to start. She isn't the only one who is lost, for somehow the message the author was attempting to relay doesn't quite get to the reader.

In the beginning, Patty tells of her 'house game.' An unsuccessful real estate agent, she's been playing this game since she was a child. When driving around, she looks at houses, then picks one she pretends is hers. The only rule is that after she picks it, she can't change her mind if something better comes along. She claims she never feels regret. Here is the big clue about Patty, and what she's doing with her life.

Patty is so preoccupied with her own lack of a love life, she misses clues her parents scatter around that something is not quite right. She throws away, without even trying him out, the ideal guy for her, fixating on someone she can never have, settling for less than she needs to - but in the end, she's moderately contented.

It isn't until the end of the book that the hollowness of Patty Anne Murphy's life comes to light. She has found meaning through her baby - but she's the fifth wheel in a warm dinner in her new home. She claims that's OK - but it sounds a bit like her acceptance of the old game rules for 'house'-- hard to believe. If you really peek closely, you can see hints that she's finding out the real thing she was waiting for wasn't the unattainable guy, nor necessarily the lovely new addition to her life - but is perhaps her acceptance of just being herself.

There seems to be a chapter missing towards the end; readers have to struggle harder than Patty to find some clues. Somehow the connection between writer and reader doesn't quite make it (as other reviewers of this book seem to agree).

It wasn't until I read the interview with Berg after the end of the story that I understood some of her deeper intents for the book. The book was OK - but in my pleasure reading I want something better to come along!

Rating:
Summary: A miss for Berg
Review: I have read only one other Elizabeth Berg, Talk Before Sleep, and fell in love with her writing after this book. For my next Berg selection I chose Until the Real Thing Comes Along and have to admit I was highly dissappointed. I give the book 2 stars only because I was able to finish the entire book in a few days as it did keep something of my attention.

From the moment I started reading this book, though, I wanted to smack some reality into the main character, Patty. Patty was in love with her best friend and refused to even try to give love a shot with other men. This frustrated me as I found Patty whining more and more about her missing love life and her want for her best friend Ethan and I wanted to tell her you will never get him to marry you so stop obsessing!

I continued reading the book just to find out if Patty ever found her dream man or ever had a baby, but finished the book with a feeling of dissatisfaction. I felt the book ended with an ending that was empty. I feel Berg left us with a simple ending and characters that readers could not totally connect with. I am moving on to Range of Motion and hope this one is better than Until the Real Thing Comes Along.

Rating:
Summary: Off-beat Love Story
Review: I'm a big fan of Elizabeth Berg and her special skill at creating characters who make us exclaim, "Yes, that's just like so and so!" I've enjoyed some of her other books more, but I can understand the elemental pull towards motherhood (after all, I'm the author of a book for mothers, NEW PSALMS FOR NEW MOMS: A KEEPSAKE JOURNAL). An interesting story.

Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable, But Not Berg's Best
Review: Warning for those who haven't read the book: spoilers.

I have been a huge fan of Elizabeth Berg's for years, ever since reading her novel "Durable Goods". She has an incredible ability to turn ordinary people into extraordinary ones through the gorgeous language and imagery she uses. There is no lack of that in "Until the Real Thing Comes Along." However, I must admit that I was disappointed with this book. I found Patty to be whiny rather than sympathetic. The plot seemed a little too convenient in too many places. How nice that Ethan, Patty's gay true love, eventually decides to get Patty pregnant. How nice that Patty's best friend Elaine and her former lover Mark get married and (almost) begin a family of their own and all three remained close. And how sad that Patty has another worry in her life with her mother getting Alzheimer's disease. All of these things are fine in and of themselves, but there was not explanation for them. They just sort of happened with too little warning to make the story really work, and often seemed almost clichéd as a result. Now, don't get me wrong. I love Elizabeth Berg's work, and I will anxiously await her next novel (and perhaps reread some of the old ones in the meantime). This was just not her best, and for an author with such a gift for stunning language, that's really disappointing.

Rating:
Summary: Enh...
Review: This is the first Berg book I've read, and while I admire her writing style, I couldn't stand the main character, Patty. She was just too self-absorbed for my taste. It drove me crazy. Ethan was a slice of heaven, but the situation they were in was incredibly unrealistic to me. I know this kind of thing does happen, but I think there should have been a lot more conflict involved.

Rating:
Summary: Painful
Review: It's painful to read the book simply because, like Patty, I also feel so much of the longing and desire to have a baby. Sometimes I do feel I want a baby more than a husband. And it strikes true when the heart rules against the sensible mind - wanting so much for the perfect one (a perfect someone for me, not the perfect man). You want to kick her and knock her head, and yes I want to kick myself too. But OK, don't judge me for that.

Berg seems to know how it all feels and and she describes the emotions well. Her language is awesome and so very true.

However, I have to say the storyline could be better. Certain things seem to be too convenient making it much less interesting.

I'm thinking of reading her other books.

Rating:
Summary: Off-beat Love Story
Review: I'm a big fan of Elizabeth Berg and her special skill at creating characters who make us exclaim, "Yes, that's just like so and so!" I've enjoyed some of her other books more, but I can understand the elemental pull towards motherhood (after all, I'm the author of a book for mothers, NEW PSALMS FOR NEW MOMS: A KEEPSAKE JOURNAL). An interesting story.

Rating:
Summary: A little dissapointed...
Review: I LOVE E. Berg, however, in this novel I thought the story was a little dragged a little and the ending was rushed. it was as if she realized this story needs to end. though Funny at times I just wished all the action didn't happen at the few last chapters.

Rating:
Summary: OK BUT LEFT OUT SO MUCH!!
Review: The idea of this book is good, but alot of it was very unrealistic. I think if this were a real situation there would have been alot more emotion and not tied up so quickly at the end. These characters just did not act like someone in this situation should act. Getting pregnant on the first try and just moving on the way the story did just did not seem real to life to me. They also seemed very immature. I just think it could have been alot more emotional and really captured the idea of the book better.

Rating:
Summary: Unsure of whether it is realistic enough for me....
Review: _Until the Real Thing Comes Along_ is a very fascinating book. The subject matter is one that I think many single women in the earlier thirties or even later has "entertained" at one time or another. I know that the subject matter really piqued my interested, as it relates to things that I had hoped to have one day - a family and a husband. At like the title implies, the main character felt that she had to compensate somehow until, you know, "the real thing did come along."

The main character, Patty, desperately wants a baby. However, she doesn't have a husband and the biological clock is ticking. She is a great character, and I loved reading about her as she developed throughout the novel. She was humorous, she had feelings, and she had problems with her family, her friends, her work, and her love life of course. She has this best friend, Ethan, who happens to be a gay man. He seemed pretty secure to me in the fact he was gay. Knowing many gay men, who too also seemed to be secure in their homosexuality, it seemed peculiar to me that Ethan went along with Patty's plan. Perhaps there are more gay men out there like Ethan that I am completely unaware of. I think this was my major hang-up with the book, which prevented me from completely enjoying it altogether.

On the whole, for an enjoyable read, and as something you will get through in the matter of a few days, I found this book to be quite satisfying and also interesting and fun too. To be entertained by a book, and to be satisfied is all that I ask, and this book accomplished both tasks. For it to draw out emotions in me, or to make me "think" about life, I would have to say it failed. But it was still not a waste by any means.