FOUR WEEKENDS AND A FUNERAL might take its title from a popular Hugh Grant movie, but it’s more of a nod to a popular Sandra Bullock one. When Allison attends the funeral of her ex boyfriend Sam, she quickly realizes he never told his family that he had dumped her. A full time adventurer, Sam’s family had wanted him to settle down with someone as solid and dependable as Alison, and Sam hadn’t had the heart to ruin his parent’s perceptions of him becoming that person too as a result of dating Alison. So when, at the funeral, Sam’s sister asks Alison to keep up the ruse for her parents benefit, she agrees, in full WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING fashion. She doesn’t realize how long she’ll have to keep pretending, though, when she agrees to help his best friend Adam clean out Sam’s condo and get it ready to sell over the course of four weekends. Adam is immediately put off by Alison’s upbeat personality, and the two learn more about each other in the process of clearing the condo.
Adam and Alison are very classic grumpy/sunshine opposites, and their begrudging chemistry works well. This definitely feels like a heartfelt story, especially as it explores the issues of identity that Alison is dealing with as a result of the recent preventative double mastectomy she had once she discovered she was a carrier of the BRCA1 marker for breast cancer. She is considering having her ovaries removed as well, and all of this was handled in a way that feels honest and unique to this story. Post double mastectomy, Alison has been trying to figure out exactly what her new lease on life will look like—she is very focused on that becoming a new, adventurous lifestyle, which is how she came to date Sam in the first place. The journey of the book is uplifting as Alison has to figure out exactly what that journey should look like for her.
While I found these aspects moving, I struggled with the tensions in this book—I wasn’t sure why Alison felt she needed to keep it a secret from Adam that Sam had dumped her, or why she assumed that Sam wouldn’t have confided that piece of info to Adam. It didn’t feel to me that it would make such a huge difference for Adam—his interest in Alison regardless is an interest in his dead best friend’s girlfriend. His comfort level with that, which is personal and would be different for different people, doesn’t seem like it would hinge entirely on whether they were still together or not at the time of Sam’s death (interestingly we never really learn how he died, which does seem to have some baring on the story and would have, I think, been helpful to know). Once the secret eventually comes out, any further friction completely seeps out of the story, so the third act conflict then felt manufactured to me. The ending is sweet, and I do really like Adam and Alison’s relationship, i just wish there could have been more twists to the set up here to make it feel like the secrets between them held more weight.
I also commend the author on finding a romantic comedy like WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING that really does deserve its flowers, even if the results were a little uneven. This was one of my favorite movies of the 90s and one (along with SPEED) that made Sandra Bullock a big, bankable star. I haven’t thought about it in years, and I think Ellie Palmer was dead on to find a way to revisit it. And the similarities between these two do work—in WYWS Lucy is a lonely transit worker who develops a crush on Peter, a businessman who takes the train every morning at the same time but who doesn’t give her more than the curtesy ‘good morning.’ When Lucy ends up pulling Peter from the path of oncoming train, she is mistaken for his fiance, a lie his family buys and which Lucy goes along with while Peter is in a coma. She warms up to his family and then feels she can’t admit the truth when she starts developing feelings for his laid back brother Jack. Some of the key differences that make that one work is that the stakes are immediately upped in that Jack is Peter’s brother as opposed to Adam being Sam’s best friend. There’s also a difference in that Peter is in a coma while Sam is dead—a difference that again ups the stakes because of course Peter could wake up at any time whereas Sam is not coming back. I think the other difference is that Lucy is really, relatably lonely and ends up falling in love with Peter’s whole family—revealing the secret means she loses them all, not just Jack. These are all small differences but give that weight to the secret between Lucy and Jack that I felt was lacking between Adam and Alison.
All of that said, FOUR WEEKENDS AND A FUNERAL is worth a read if only for the chemistry between Adam and Alison and the exploration of survivor’s guilt that Alison is experiencing following her preventative surgery. It feels realistic and grounded between the two of them and it’s certainly a heartfelt read.
3.5 Stars
Synopsis (from Amazon):
She found the right guy at the dead wrong time . . .
When thirty-year-old post-double-mastectomy BRCA1 carrier and reluctant thrill-seeker Alison Mullally arrives at her ex-boyfriend Sam’s funeral to discover that no one knows he dumped her, she agrees to play the grieving girlfriend for the sake of the family. Little did she know this would mean packing up Sam’s apartment with his prickly best friend, Adam Berg. After all, it’ll only take four weekends . . .
But Adam doesn’t want Alison anywhere near him. Forced to spend long hours with the grump and his monosyllabic demeanor, Alison decides to put her people-pleasing abilities to the test. She will make him like her. And after awkward family affairs and packing up dilemmas, the two form a tenuous friendship . . . if “friendship” means incredible chemistry and sexual tension. Can Alison come clean and finally embrace the life and love she’s always wanted? Or will her little white lie get in the way of her new, unexpected romance?
