Review by Ann McDonald
The Idea of Him is a novel of conspiracy, intrigue, and intense passion—and discovering your greatest strength through your deepest fears.
The story begins with Allie in a taxi cab in New York during rush hour. She is very upset at the antics of the driver who is cutting in and out of traffic and insanely speeding up and down roads and because of this, she is drawn back in time to a small plane in a snow storm that goes down and kills her father. She has not forgiven him for taking her on that plane and then leaving her. That pretty much sets the stage for the story that Holly Peterson is about to introduce us to. She is married to a hot shot magazine editor called Wade, a self-serving man with the morals of an alley cat. His character was never never more than a cardboard cutout throughout the story and she moves him here and then moves him there and in the end, she moves him completely out of the picture and leaves you hanging with no final confrontation.
The setting for all the goings on is the Tudor Rooms, an upper-class restaurant where only the self-made rich and wealthy congregate. Allie works as a P.R. executive for Murray, one of the self-made who reminded me of Jabba the Hut. He spends his time screaming and shouting at Allie to fix this and fix that and generally kicking her around like a football. But our Allie fixes this and fixes that and accepts the pat on the head. A beautiful woman makes herself known to Allie, warning her to open her eyes to things that are going on and looking around the Tudor Rooms at all the Wall Street hot shots, TV and movie stars and computer whizzes, you have to wonder, like Allie, just what the heck she’s talking about.
The story is long-drawn out, it’s convoluted and in the end, it really makes no sense whatsoever. Shenanigans with stocks being manipulated and high-class hookers with mothers who run garden centers, Peterson draws on their backgrounds to paint the picture for us about the ‘beautiful’ people but sadly, it doesn’t translate. When she stays on track, the story works but then some other idea presents itself and Allie is lost again. Her choices in men leave you scratching your head in disbelief and exclaiming out loud, “Are you out of your mind girl?” In the end, you hope hope she’ll have a ‘Happily Ever After’, and with a little help from an unlikely assortment of new friends, maybe she will.
In stores April 1st
