How Hard Can It Be?

Product Information

Don’t worry, sweetheart. It’s OK,” I say, maneuvering us both awkwardly toward the door, guided by the chink of light from the landing. “Whatever it is, we can fix it, I promise. It’ll be fine.” Thank you to Allison Pearson and St. Martin’s Press for the print ARC. How Hard Can It Be will be published on June 5, 2018. Emily is by my side of the bed, bent over as if in prayer or protecting a wound. “Please don’t tell Daddy,” she pleads. “You can’t tell him, Mummy.”

Few sequels beat the original, but How Hard Can It Be? does so hands down ... zesty, razor-sharp and hilarious. It’s full of such quotable casual profundity on the female condition I couldn't read it without a pencil to underline the abundance of great lines. Get ready for Kate!’ TINA BROWN, magazine editor and bestselling author Monday, 1:37 A.M. Such a weird dream. Emily is crying, she’s really upset. Something about a belfry. A boy wants to come round to our house because of her belfry. She keeps saying she’s sorry, it was a mistake, she didn’t mean to do it. Strange. Most of my nightmares lately feature me on my unmentionable birthday having become totally invisible and talking to people who can’t hear me or see me. The top end of OK. This has been sitting about a while and is a compilation of Clarkson's Sunday Times columns from 2008-9 so it is something of an instructive wander down Memory Lane as well as a handy bag book for a train journey (aside from feeling faintly as though a plain cover is required) Of course all written pre his final fall from grace and the end of Top Gear and indeed the end of his long marriage.The main character decides to take a break from her CPA world and try writing a romance novel. How hard could it be, right? She meets a wonderful group of old ladies, and turns beet red as they talk about sex, s&m, and so on as if they were talking about their grocery list. Then enters the evil Evangeline, who has a huge career as a romance novelist. But it turns out she has stolen everything she has ever written. The only thing she's good at is digging up dirt and using it against people to get her way.

Jeremy Clarkson is outspoken. We all know that, given recent comments that made worldwide media headlines. He’s also very funny, not only on the TV, but in print too. How Hard Can it Be?, which Top Gear fans will know as one of the show’s catch cries (along with ‘Loser!’ and ‘That’s not gone well, has it?’). This is not a book of Top Gear anecdotes (how good would that be?), but the fourth collection of his newspaper columns published in the UK. This may be a detractor for those readers in the UK, but not for those Down Under. (These are not motoring columns, although cars and other transport do feature occasionally, but articles on what is wrong with the world at large). Seven years later, Kate Reddy is facing her 50th birthday. Her children have turned into impossible teenagers; her mother and in-laws are in precarious health; and her husband is having a midlife crisis that leaves her desperate to restart her career after years away from the workplace. Once again, Kate is scrambling to keep all the balls in the air in a juggling act that an early review from the UK Express hailed as "sparkling, funny, and poignant...a triumphant return for Pearson." Although not my usual genre, I had heard many good things about Allison's previous book 'I Don't Know How She Does It', and so decided to enter the giveaway for 'How Hard Can It Be?'. I'm delighted I won as I loved this book! (I will now definitely be seeking out the first one to read too). Although this is a continuation of 'I Don't Know...', it stands by itself as well and I wasn't confused by the story at any point.She is subsequently successful at getting a job at an investment company of which she used to be the owner, but nobody recognizes her because there's been a complete turnover in personnel since she left seven years ago. From that point on it's a story of a woman sandwiched between problems and demands from her children and aging mother and in-laws dealing with incipient dementia. Also, her husband is less than helpful, and she's dealing with pressures from work and needing to remember that she's pretending to younger than her real age. I highly recommend this book, especially to all the women in the sandwich generation. I will be immediately seeking out Ms. Pearson’s first book.

Allison Pearson writes with great insight - the characters literally come to life in her hands. It's funny, it's sad, it's delightful, and as a woman it's easy for me to recognise the challenges and conflicts that Kate has to face. Loved it! This was a good book. I really enjoyed it and sadly, related to a lot of it. With menopause looming in the near future, it was really fun to have her perspective on menopause and reaching fifty years of age. And then with the unhappy marriage and the teenagers to deal with as well, I found myself laughing and wanting to cry all the way through. Perceptive and funny....Allison Pearson has a gift for comedy, but the best bits of How Hard Can It Be? are her sharp asides about modern life." -- The Times (U.K.)And, you know, I really thought it would be fine, because what could be so bad in the life of a teenage girl that her mother couldn’t make it better? The following excerpt was selected because it shows how problems in the daughter's life parallel those of the mother. In the following quotation our protagonist is editing her daughter's school assignment to analyze Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night" and she considers the writing about Shakespeare also reflects the dilemmas of teenage life that her daughter faces. The irony is that the same can be said for Kate herself, our book's narrator. Plenty of shrewd insights to make up for the dodgy spelling. She really should have more confidence in herself, but girls like Emily set themselves impossibly high standards so they never feel good about themselves. What was it she said to me? “I’m not the cleverest, I’m not the prettiest, I’m not the anythingest.” It’s the disease of the day. ... ... How Hard Can It Be? is that rare thing: a sequel that matches and even surpasses the original’ Daily Telegraph As she becomes intertwined with this tight-nit writers group, she realizes there is more to the story of porno writing grannies vs. viper bitch. How far will Rena go to take down this crazy bitch and set her new friends free? Can she keep the Fuzz off her tail long enough to make things right?

The winning follow-up to Pearson’s bestselling I Don’t Know How She Does It is anchored by heroine Kate Reddy’s authentic, intelligent, and consistently funny British voice....Pearson maintains a humorous tone throughout, wresting laughs from her lead’s lowest moments and greatest triumphs. Pearson also hits the right notes in conveying the cluelessness and powerlessness parents feel raising teens obsessed by gaming and social media." — Publishers Weekly (starred review) That’s 400m people saying, on average, 1,500 words a day. Week in, week out. You’d imagine, then, that every single combination would have been used up years ago, and yet we can be certain no one has ever said: ‘I name this ship HMS Vulnerable.’ Or: ‘The thing I love most about my husband is his herpes.’ Or: ‘Look at that maniac in that Saab."The best part of this book was the absolutely horrible trashy novel the main character writes for the evil...ummm...woman. It's so horrible that all you can do is laugh, especially at all the words for penis she comes up with. "Skin flute, pork sword, love muscle..." Filled with humor and wit, readers will cheer on Kate as she navigates this frenzied life and struggles to hold everything--and everyone--together." --Shereads.com That thread of a marriage crumbling and her new affair would have made a great story on his own. Affair guy was yummy and hubby was useless. (Even his kids didn’t miss him when he finally moved out). These stories where the ex-husband ends up with twins and endless sleepless nights are such a fun revenge for the now independent ex-wife who finally gets some freedom after raising her family. He writes weekly columns for The Sunday Times and The Sun, but is better known for his role on the BBC television programme Top Gear. Meanwhile, dementia, class expectations, menopause, self-harming teens, and the stresses that can break a marriage get dealt with . . .and the book finds a balance between compassion, insight, and wish-fulfillment that finally pays off splendidly.