Skip to main content
PBS logo
 
 

Search - The Wonder Spot

The Wonder Spot
The Wonder Spot
Author: Melissa Bank
Melissa Bank’s debut, The Girls’ Guide to Hunting and Fishing, was a literary landmark and a runaway bestseller. Now, in The Wonder Spot, she reminds us why she has been compared to John Cheever and Raymond Carver. Shaped by Bank’s trademark blend of emotional depth and wry humor, The Wonder Spot traces the...  more »
Info icon
The Market's bargain prices are even better for Paperbackswap club members!
Retail Price: $16.00
Buy New (Paperback): $12.79 (save 20%) or
Become a PBS member and pay $8.89+1 PBS book credit Help icon(save 44%)
ISBN-13: 9780143037217
ISBN-10: 0143037218
Publication Date: 5/30/2006
Pages: 336
Rating:
  • Currently 3.6/5 Stars.
 116

3.6 stars, based on 116 ratings
Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Book Type: Paperback
Other Versions: Hardcover, Audio Cassette, Audio CD
Reviews: Member | Amazon | Write a Review

Top Member Book Reviews

Dartha avatar reviewed The Wonder Spot on + 102 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 5
This book is awesome.
The writing style is somewhat like riding as a passenger when someone is trying to learn to drive a stickshift, which I HATE. But I LOVED this book. It may have been a confluence of the right book at the right time in the right place in the right frame of mind, but once again, this book was awesome. Enough to make me break a vow to myself about not reading hyped up and oversold books as I am now going to request the author's other book "Girl's guide to Hunting and Fishing".
reviewed The Wonder Spot on + 42 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 4
This book changed my life.
reviewed The Wonder Spot on + 102 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 3
I liked this book a lot. Quick read. It's even better than her first book "Girls Guide to Hunting and Fishing".
reviewed The Wonder Spot on + 5 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 3
If I wrote short stories, I'd want them to be like these. A very good book!
reviewed The Wonder Spot on + 38 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 3
I liked this book quite a bit; however, I don't think it's particularly memorable. Readable, yes.
Read All 29 Book Reviews of "The Wonder Spot"

Please Log in to Rate these Book Reviews

farfella68 avatar reviewed The Wonder Spot on + 84 more book reviews
I didn't really like this book. It is about a girl, Sophie, and all of the men she has encountered throughout her life. She lives in New York City. She works in advertising but doesn't like it. She is waiting for something better to come along, but doesn't try hard enough to change jobs or get something different. As I read the book, I kept waiting for something to happen, like her falling in love or actually liking the life she is living. I must have missed something because I really didn't understand what the book was about. In fact, it kind of depressed me.
reviewed The Wonder Spot on
This was a really fun read by an author with an unique writing style. I didn't know what to expect when I started this, but I thoroughly enjoyed it!
reviewed The Wonder Spot on + 10 more book reviews
I loved Melissa Bank's first book "The Girls Guide to Hunting and Fishing" so I was eager to read this when I had heard she had written another book but I was not impressed with this one. I felt it had no plot, meaning or purpose, therefore no ending.
reviewed The Wonder Spot on + 4 more book reviews
Having read professional reviews of this book, I was so looking forward to the story. Huge disappointment .
reviewed The Wonder Spot on + 43 more book reviews
Sophie, the main character in this book, is completely unlikable, annoying, and on an aimless journey of avoiding self-awareness. The book, written in chunks, almost like short stories about the various pieces of Sophie's life, mostly related to her ill-fated and failed romances and her dully average family, comes across as disjointed and pointless.

She narrates relationship after relationship with the men in her life with an astounding cluelessness and lack of ability to determine why each one ends unhappily. When she's not talking about boyfriends or family, she hovers around her issues with learning at school and at work, but we never learn what's wrong with her (and there is obviously something VERY wrong with this girl emotionally and intellectually). Is it dyslexia? Laziness? ADD/ADHD? Is she a late bloomer?

When the author doesn't provide the answer, the reader has to fill it in, and, ultimately, the answer is, I don't care.
reviewed The Wonder Spot on
Not quite as good as The Girls Guide to Hunting and Fishing but still an enjoyable read.


Genres: