'Fall Girl' by Toni Jordan

From the BLURB:

‘The secret to having people give you money is to act as though you don’t want it.’

Meet Ella Canfield, highly qualified evolutionary biologist. Attractive, if a little serious-looking in those heavy glasses—but then she’s about to put her career on the line. Dr Canfield is seeking funding for a highly unorthodox research project. She wants to prove that an extinct animal still roams in one of Australia’s most popular national parks.

Meet Daniel Metcalf, good-looking, expensively dishevelled millionaire. Quite witty but far too rich to be taken seriously. He heads the Metcalf Trust, which donates money to offbeat scientific research projects. He has a personal interest in animals that don’t exist.

Problem number one: There is no such person as Dr Ella Canfield.

Problem number two: Della Gilmore, professional con artist, has never met anyone like Daniel Metcalf before.

Someone is going to take a fall.

‘Fall Girl’ was the 2011 novel from Australian author, Toni Jordan.

Yes – this is my newfound Toni Jordanobsession continuing. Deliciously. Deliriously. Thanks to the character of Della Gilmore.

‘Fall Girl’ is indeed all about a family of scam-artists (emphasis on *artist*) and young woman Della who had a most unconventional upbringing, learning from her Fagin-esque father all the tricks of the scam trade. When we meet her she’s in the midst of her biggest haul yet – for a scientific grant being offered by the handsome millionaire, Daniel Metcalf. Della is posing as a scientist on the hunt for the biggest breakthrough of the decade – the Tasmanian Tiger.  

What follows is a Spencer Tracy & Katharine Hepburn type romance that also reminded me of nothing so much as the brilliant (if underrated, in my opinion) 2015 film ‘Focus’ starring Will Smith and Margot Robbie. Maybe with a smattering of 2004 British TV show ‘Hustle’ thrown in for good measure.

I’ve really gone from 0 to 100 with Toni Jordan – who I think I can now confidently count as one of my favourite authors. Hands down. ‘Fall Girl’ cemented the deal for me – a sexy and clever caper, that kind of reads like a magic trick (or another sleight of hand) … she waggles this high-stakes scam with a searing romance running underneath as the heart of the plot, but at the same time she’s unearthing a family drama and delicate character portrayals of an unconventional family unit, out of time and out of step with a changing world. I loved it.

I still have one more Toni Jordan book to read – her first historical novel ‘Nine Days’ – which I know will be a real change of pace, but one I’m curious to read. And after that …? I think I’ll become rather desperate for my next fix!  

5/5

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'Addition' by Toni Jordan

From the BLURB:

Grace Lisa Vandenburg counts. The letters in her name (19). The steps she takes every morning to the local café (920); the number of poppy seeds on her slice of orange cake, which dictates the number of bites she’ll take to finish it. Grace counts everything, because numbers hold the world together. And she needs to keep an eye on how they’re doing.

Seamus Joseph O'Reilly (also a 19, with the sexiest hands Grace has ever seen) thinks she might be better off without the counting. If she could hold down a job, say. Or open her kitchen cupboards without conductng an inventory, or make a sandwich containing an unknown number of sprouts.

Grace’s problem is that Seamus doesn’t count. Her other problem is…he does.

‘Addition’ is a fabulous debut novel. Grace is witty, flirtatious and headstrong. She’s not a bit sentimental but even so, she may be about to lose track of the number of ways she can fall in love.

‘Addition’ was Australian author Toni Jordan’s 2008 debut novel. It is both a romantic comedy and heartfelt tale of mental health and individuality.

I have owned but not read this book since 2008, and have known of its brilliance for that long too. This is partly because Toni Jordan attended the same RMIT writing and editing course as I did (she graduated a few years before I attended though) and all my lecturers raved about her and the breakout success of ‘Addition’ – a few of my lecturers are even thanked in the acknowledgments.

And yet – 2017 is the year of Toni Jordan for me (or, well – technically 2016 was but I couldn’t remember my Christmas read of ‘Our Tiny Useless Hearts’ so … nevermind!) 2017 is the year of Toni Jordan for me. I think I’m going to read all of her books as a treat to myself, and after this – ‘Fall Girl’ will be next!

‘Addition’ is about 35-year-old obsessive-compulsive counter Grace, who is on leave from her teaching job because her counting compulsion came to the attention of parents (“they wanted me teaching their children, not counting them,” she explains at one point). Grace is high-functioning in her compulsion, so long as she sticks to routines and keeps her life patterned by numbers her world will keep ticking along … number of steps to the café, poppy seeds in a slice of orange cake, 10 bananas bought from the supermarket. Her one true love is similarly tortured-by-numbers inventor Nikola Tesla, whose photo is framed and sits by her bedside.

Then Grace steals Seamus’ banana. This is not a euphemism. She swipes it from his grocery basket while waiting in line at the supermarket – to complete her perfect 10. Over the next few days, Grace’s carefully ordered patterns seem to keep leading her back to Seamus … and the two eventually embark on a relationship (Grace’s first in three years).

What follows is both an utterly sexy and tender romance, and a heartbreaking exploration of mental health that questions conformity and normality in the most respectful and humorous ways.

And let’s make something 100% clear – this is a romance (to me, at least – Bookthingo thought differently and that’s okay). But to me – it’s also a *hot* romance. I am coming to quickly admire Toni Jordan’s sweetly sensual stories which beautifully uphold the one true romance rule for me – that is, that our female protagonist has to stand a little taller by the end of the novel. And on her own two feet, with a companion who encourages her autonomy but wishes to be apart of her journey. If I have any complaints about the book, it’s that I would have liked a little bit more – and especially scenes of Grace meeting Seamus’s family.

I am loving my journey through Toni Jordan’s backlist, and I’m not even a little sorry that it’s taken me this long to finally get around to reading her … because these are just the books I needed *right now*. To get me out of a few reading slumps, and to be companionable friends when world events start squeezing in. I’m not sorry that I’ve taken a while to join the Toni Jordan fan-club, I’m just happy that I found my way eventually.

5/5

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'Our Tiny, Useless Hearts' by Toni Jordan

From the BLURB:

Henry has ended his marriage to Caroline and headed off to Noosa with Mercedes’ grade three teacher, Martha.

Caroline, having shredded a wardrobe-full of Henry’s suits, has gone after them.

Craig and Lesley have dropped over briefly from next door to catch up on the fallout from Henry and Caroline’s all-night row.

And Janice, Caroline’s sister, is staying for the weekend to look after the girls because Janice is the sensible one. A microbiologist with a job she loves, a fervent belief in the beauty of the scientific method and a determination to make a solo life after her divorce from Alec.

Then Craig returns through the bedroom window expecting a tryst with Caroline and finds Janice in her bed, Lesley storms in with a jealous heart and a mouthful of threats, Henry, Caroline and Martha arrive back from the airport in separate taxis—and let’s not even get started on Brayden the pizza guy.

Janice can cope with all that. But when Alec knocks on the door things suddenly get complicated.

Harnessing the exquisite timing of the great comedies to the narrative power and emotional intelligence for which she is famous, Toni Jordan brings all her wit, wisdom and flair to this brilliant, hilarious novel.

‘Our Tiny Useless Hearts’ is a 2016 romantic comedy novel from Australian author, Toni Jordan.

I did read this in December last year. But I clearly have brain-fog for the entire Christmas month and cannot for the life of me remember the reading clearly … so I spontaneously decided to re-read Toni Jordan’s comedy about love and marriage, and I was absolutely rapt.

This is the first Toni Jordan book I’ve ever read, but after doing so I (must have enjoyed it, back in December?) went out and bought her other novels ‘Addition’ and ‘Fall Girl’, and now that I’ve had a rebooted reading I intend to get stuck into those ASAP too!

I won’t even try to recount the plot of this book – instead I’ll say it’s a sort of modern Melbourne suburban take on Wilde’s ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’, except the comedy-of-manners is more a comedy-of-morons who’ve lost their heads and hearts to utterly foolish infidelities and self-inflicted heartburn. It really is wonderful!

Liane Moriarty provides an endorsement quote, calling it “cutting and clever, and yet so very romantic, as though P. G. Wodehouse had satirised life in the suburbs.” This is a very appropriate endorsee – because Toni Jordan’s novel did remind me of Liane Moriarty’s work, minus the seedy underbelly that goes with her explorations of love and betrayal. Jordan takes a much more light-hearted approach, that still manages to cut to the heart of the matter;

‘Something special, I mean. Your moment, whatever that means.’ 

He breathes out in a rush and leans against the side of the house, he tilts his head back and rests his hands on his thighs. ‘I think everybody feels like that.’ 

‘What if it never happens? What if we’re all here, getting ready, like our entire life is the night before the first day of school, and we’re waiting and waiting and the moment we’re preparing for – it never actually comes?’

Jordan’s novel is also a romance. Through and through. Which is great, and also caught me off guard because Toni Jordan is *so* beloved in Australia and especially by indie bookstores (again – wonderful! And what took me so long to get cluey?!) – but generally Melbourne publishing has an issue with romance … insofar as they don’t respect it very much. There’s no doubt that Jordan brilliantly weaves romance with marital dramas, family observations, and general suburban rot too;

‘When you ask the little boys in my class what they want to be when they grow up, none of them say “a man”,’ says Martha. ‘They all want to be boys for ever, but boys who have a magnet in their chest that prevents anything touching their heart. And that also powers their flying iron suit, so they can live in their penthouse with their car collection and play video games with their friends.’

… but all romance does this. Toni Jordan is writing contemporary romance, but I see her often getting labelled as ‘women’s fiction’ – but I hope romance readers of Australia are like me and have found their way to her hot, biting observations of the up’s and down’s of love. It’s totally worth it!

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5/5  

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