The title gave me a momentary flashback to Machines Like You, the Ian McEwan disappointment of 2019, but luckily this novel is also about something current but at the same time completely different; Brexit. This is strangely topical again, even though the novel is set mostly in 2016 (which only makes you realise how long that whole process has taken). However, Brexit is merely the background against which the novel plays out, so I can see why there isn't a play on that word in the title, which is of course a song reference (no Hornby novel is without music).
The actual story is a romance between two people as unalike as possible; a twenty-something working class black guy and a forty-something middle class white woman. If that sounds like a hard pill to swallow, you don't know Nick Hornby; he has written novels about the most painful of subjects that are still light-hearted and fun while carrying a deeper message underneath.
Another apt title for this novel could have been Pride & Prejudice in the 21st Century. The combination of younger man and older woman is one I haven't read that often (the same can not be said for the other way around) and this novel brought home how ingrained class differences still are in the UK. Added to that, the racial stereotyping is far worse than I've ever experienced myself, going from this novel. But maybe that is just me speaking from my privileged bubble. Anyway, the characters themselves are not exempt from stereotyping, hard as they try not to give in to it (reading the title as "That is just like you!"). Lucy is disappointed that Joseph's church doesn't come with gospel singing and dancing. Joseph is sure Lucy's dinner party will be boring as he will have nothing in common with the people there. But it's mostly the people around them making a fuss, almost everybody has an opinion about the situation save Lucy's two sons, who are happy to just play FIFA with Joseph and not be bothered about his age, race or social class.
Lucy and Joseph fall in love without either of them really knowing it; Hornby is a master of the 'show, don't tell' craft. They encounter the predictable bumps in the road, some of which exist more in their own minds than in reality, but overall they see mainly the things that connect them (reading the title as "I feel just like you!"). This is the light-hearted, happy part of the novel.
Things go a bit sour when Hornby himself steps in some stereotyping traps; some characters are flat as a board, only existing to serve as contrast to others. Brexit is one such topic where everything is either black or white; all Josephs circle vote leave, while everybody Lucy knows is a Remainer. I cannot help but think that surely there were shades of grey in between there somewhere? Josephs solution, to vote both sides just to not disappoint anyone, is maybe one Nick Hornby himself could have taken on several occasions where he turns up the contrast a bit to high.
But in the end Brexit is merely a backdrop against which a unique and ultimately pretty believable romance plays out. This is the saving grace of the novel; how Lucy and Joseph feel like people you might actually meet, with all their insecurities and doubts, people you are rooting for to make it together.
ETA: I just discovered that the Dutch translation of the novel is called 'Op het eerste gezicht', which translates as 'At first sight'. Or if you want to be more poetical; 'First Impressions', which is the original title Jane Austen gave to Pride & Prejudice. And so it all comes full circle.
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