Attachments

Attachments, by Rainbow Rowell.

"Do those papers mean that you're going back to school?"

"Not immediately." The fall semester had already started."

"I don't know how I feel about that, Lincoln. I'm starting to think you might have a problem. With school."
....
"You know what I mean, she said. She wagged a dirty spoon at him. "A problem. Like those women who get addicted to plastic surgery. They keep going back and going back, trying to look better until there is no more better. Like they can't look better because they don't even look like themselves anymore. And then it's just about looking different, I think."

Lincoln has an unusual job - he reads other people's email at The Courier, the paper he works at. He works the night shift and his job is to sort through whatever "WebFence" finds to be "offensive," and then send the offending parties an email warning them to only use their office computer for work and not personal emails. When he starts reading an email exchange between Beth and Jennifer, however, he becomes interested in their emails and decides not to send them the warning email, so he can read more of their emails. He also starts to fall for Beth ... and the crazy thing is, she starts to fall for him, too, after seeing him a few times around the office.

This book was really unconventional and I liked it a lot. It takes place in 1999, which may explain why The Courier had just started to let their employees use the internet/email. Lincoln is a character worth rooting for, and Rainbow Rowell gives us not only his back story, but we can see what Lincoln someday aspires to be (first step: moving out of his mom's house). I was really hoping that Beth and Lincoln end up together, and the ending is definitely upbeat. I love stories that incorporate "emails" into the narrative too, and this was a fun book to read.

4.5 stars out of 5.