Don and Rosie are at it again...My review of The Rosie Effect by G. Simison

Greetings earthlings...and fellow lovers of Don and Rosie. Welcome to the review is The Rosie Effect. Okay...now I can stop playing around. The Rosie Effect brings us back to the odd and rather hilarious relationship of fellow (now married) scientist Don and Rosie. In this book Don and Rosie are just as lovable as always. Well almost. We meet up with them this time in New York, Don is a visiting professor at Columbia and Rosie is working her way towards finishing her thesis and entering medical school.
While all that seems so innocent, so simple. It's anything but. Don is thrust into "a disaster" the moment Rosie reveals that she's pregnant. In fact he has a full on melt down. The entire novel revolves around Don trying to prove to her that he is good enough to be a father. Something that (through a few missteps) both he and Rosie doubt he can be.
What was so frustrating about this book was that Don seems to be judged for his social ackwardness. In fact he is told, by one of the supporting characters, to never have children. If you have read the first book you will know that Don I believed to have Asperger syndrome; a form of autism - in which it makes it hard for one to communicate and socialize. In my opinion, it's this that makes Don so charming and realistic as a character. Well the overall novel ended on high note, most of it made me hate a beloved character. Rosie.
Once I had time to really think on it, and reflect on the story it dawned on me that Rosie is highly emotional due to her pregnancy, her stress from
school. Her actions are some what of a response from societal pressures; to take a break and have her baby and let men make the decision for her. And she is also dealing with feelings of isolation and loneliness, maybe even depression and abandonment. All the while she is dealing with Don and his tone deaf attitude towards her pregrancy.
In all this I can relate to Rosie; and see that Simsion created in her a character of deep emotional who is very much like so many young women trying to balance their need to mother, wife and ambitious at work and school at the same time. I deeply enjoyed this book and I can not wait to see what else Simsion cooks up for Don, Rosie and baby. I have The Rosie Effect 4/5 stars on Goodreads.

Here are some of the quotes I loved:

"Highly intelligent people are often bullied. As a result of being different. That difference being high intelligence."

"I am well aware of my incompetence in predicting human reactions. But I would have been prepared to bet on the first word that Rosie would say when she received the information. I was correct by a factor of six. ‘Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck."