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Summary and Reviews of Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine

by Gail Honeyman
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  • Critics' Consensus (4):
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  • First Published:
  • May 9, 2017, 336 pages
  • Paperback:
  • Jun 2018, 352 pages
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About This Book

Book Summary

Smart, warm, uplifting, Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine is the story of an out-of-the-ordinary heroine whose deadpan weirdness and unconscious wit make for an irresistible journey.

No one's ever told Eleanor that life should be better than fine.

Meet Eleanor Oliphant: She struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she's thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life of avoiding social interactions, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy. 

But everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office. When she and Raymond together save Sammy, an elderly gentleman who has fallen on the sidewalk, the three become the kinds of friends who rescue one another from the lives of isolation they have each been living. And it is Raymond's big heart that will ultimately help Eleanor find the way to repair her own profoundly damaged one.

Smart, warm, uplifting, Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine is the story of an out-of-the-ordinary heroine whose deadpan weirdness and unconscious wit make for an irresistible journey as she realizes...

The only way to survive is to open your heart. 

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    Costa Book Awards
    2017

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Reviews

BookBrowse Review

BookBrowse

Odd Eleanor slowly enters a life that she never thought was for her. She remains quirky and unique, and the reader loves her for it, but her life becomes a little more expansive and contains a bit more opportunity. Gail Honeyman wrote this novel as she entered her forties. Just like her protagonist, Honeyman learned that your past does not have to define your future. Eleanor may be a social misfit, but she is an incredibly astute one. Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine is perceptive, wise, funny and utterly readable...continued

Full Review (620 words)

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(Reviewed by Francesca Baker).

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Beyond the Book



Nudge Theory

In Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine, the protagonist's lack of knowledge or understanding of social norms and conventions evokes sympathy, and leaves her lonely and isolated, at odds with the world. She expresses bafflement at many, and rightly so – they simply do not make sense. But social norms are not just cultural oddities and habits. They are powerful, can be both positive and negative – but are able to be changed. Governments and brands around the world are harnessing their potential for impact.

Nudge theory is a type of behavioral economics based on the idea that by creating situations and circumstances that make certain behavior and activity more attractive, individuals can be encouraged to change. In their 2008 ...

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Read-Alikes

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