Fromage-The Secret Shopper Unwrapped Part 3

Thursday, 08 December 2011

Things took a turn for the very weird in the next section, I was actually getting afraid of this book. Sandie goes with Toby, her uber charming boyfriend, to his mothers mansion for Chrimbo dinner, with her mother and grandmother. Pretty typical chic-lit fare, except that the "mansion" is old, falling apart and Sandie gets stuck in sort of "servants quarters". Toby's mother is some sort of evil, racist, drunk who does NOT make any sort of effort and/or Christmas dinner but does make lots of snide comments about Sandie and her unwanted pregnancy. Sandie doesn't tell Toby she is pregnant and still is dithering about about whether she will get an  "A-word" or not. Basically it is the most horrid Christmas ever. She runs away, as that seems to be all she does in this book. While she is away, Kelly does as she is supposed to for the evil, cigar smoking villain. Also, she has a "DARK PAST". WHAT WILL IT BE? I thought she was going to have been a prostitute or something fo' sure! Meanwhile, Emily's evil ex-husband has been spying on her via the evil teddy-bear and has learned that she spends the maintenance on things other than Freddie (her son) and then he threatens her and steals Freddie for Christmas holidays. Emily whines about this for a lot pages and her boyfriend Will is as fed up as I am with her. He tells her "maybe we should rethink our relationship" and she is like "OH NOOOOO HE IS LEAVING ME" because she also doesn't realise  that she is in a chic lit and it is one about Christmas and she definitely isn't going to get left on Christmas. Derr. Anyway, Grazia goes with her new hot boyfriend to his family gathering where she concludes that she has to break up with him because he will one day want kids and her womb is, apparently, a wrinkled prune. She runs away. I think I have identified the problems with modern society-everyone is running away from their problems like there is no tomorrow! She goes back to London where the two other girls are distraught and show up at her house and feast on fine Christmas cuisine and share their tackiest most favourite Christmas memories. All is not going well though. Kelly, suddenly decides she doesn't want to be a bad person and calls Al, some guy she works with who has high moral standards and also a past in the military. They head off to Sandie's in an attempt to avert disaster and the book, in an attempt to avoid disaster skips this scene. The gist is Al gets beat up and the house gets burned down. Sandie reunites with Toby and chooses this time when their flat has burned down and she has run off on him AGAIN, to tell him that she is pregnant. He is like "You were going to abort the baby without talking to me even though I don't think I want it or maybe I do, I HAVE NO IDEA." She is like ...eerrr, and you know she is about to run away again but she doesn't. Toby's evil mother shows up and tells her if she signs a paper that say she is gold digging slut and doesn't put Toby's name on the birth certificate she will get lots of money. Sandie is about to do it, since she loves being miserable, when Toby comes in and is all "my mom is a psycho, I want to have our baby!!!". YAY, they live happily ever after. Kelly confides her secret past of near rape to Al and they move in together and almost kiss but don't, but maybe later??? Who knows. Grazia is about to break up with Nigel when she is like "WAIT! I don't want to die alone after all" and they make out in a cab. Will comes back and tells Emily to get rid of her ex, make her own money and they will all live happily ever after. They all get chicken pox. Finally, they all resolve to be better people.
I have to say, this book was quite a cheese fest, which you know I like, but my one complaint is-this book has SHOPPING in the title, and absolutely no shopping in the book.