Hanukkah at the Great Greenwich Ice Creamery
By: Sharon Ibbotson / Narrated By: David Thorpe
Length: 6 hrs and 19 mins
HorRIFic beginning eeeeeases into sweet, soo sweet, like, I mean, reeeally sweet sweet sweeeet
So! Like, Big Sis and I were on a FaceTime for enTIREly different reasons when Hanukkah at the Great Greenwich Ice Creamery came up in conversation, and oh gosh! did she start speaking in ALL CAPS when she began venting her thoughts on it: Hateful, nothing nice, just anger Anger ANGER!!!
Uh oh, thought I to m’self. That certainly did NOT bode well for an audiobook that I’d yet to get around to. -But- Ever openminded, she gave me the okay to let her know if it got any better, that maybe she’d finish it if it did (Cuz, you see, she’d stopped listening in huuuuge amounts of disgust).
But I NEVER pull a Did Not Finish, that’d be aTROcious reviewing, so I began the audiobook, wondering what a Brit narrator was doing since our Hero and main protagonist was verrrry American, and oh my. Wouldn’t ya know it: The beginning of the story is just vile, Vile, VILE spleen-spewing.
Our Hero, Cohen Ford, is an American who’s left his upended life (A NOT amicable divorce; a job he haaates but is very good at; his Jewish mama who wasn’t there for him as a kid but who is now waaay up in his business), and flown willy nilly to a year in London. Whilst delivering a package, he vents and spews anger and venom over getting his nice, nice, nice shoes and slacks wet in the dreary London winter. Upon entering the ice cream shop, he bangs his head on the doorway, and bleeding, a young woman silently takes pity on him, and she wipes away the blood with a warm cloth. He’s instantly kinda sorta smitten, but is brought back to reality by the young woman’s over-protective mom. This girl is NOT for you she shouts! but, truly, Cohen knows he’ll be back. The young woman’s name is River, and she happens to be deaf (I’m not going to capitalize “deaf” as throughout the book, she doesn’t appear to identify with the Deaf culture).
All well and good, and I was soooo relieved that there was a bit of sweetness developing cuz, Oh. My. Good golly gosh, the intro to the book was so much verbal sparring with his mother, a woman therapist who goes to great lengths to call Cohen every name in the book. And then River’s mom is quite the shrew as well. And lemme start m’ review of David Thorpe’s narration right here. He manages Cohen’s American accent decently enough, but good cow his choices for strong Jewish women are over-the-top stereotypical. Add River’s mom being an Asian in London, and we get yet another belittling stereotypical accent. Uhm, I dunno if I’m just being hypersensitive -but- YIKES! I wound up feeling offended for groups I’m not a part of, and I wondered just how said groups took his choices. Which, I feel, were poor. So Boooo, Mr. Thorpe. I applaud you for not mangling the American accent, but oh my… So there’s that.
Now back to the story.
All sorts of Changes start to occur in Cohen’s life and in his mindset, and where his heart happens to truly be.
And eeeeeeasy. Soooo easy. No problems that usually, nay: Dare I say it, ALWAYS happen with Major Changes. Dude, change is hard, and change usually causes, at best: Desperate unease. In reality, there’s usually some grief attached as one way of life has to be let go of, and there are usually struggles, esPECially if ya just HAPPEN to be in a super duper High Powered Job and, like, on the cusp of taking over the entire company. Seriously? All off without a single hitch?
Not in my world.
But anyhoo, I go on about it, but when all was said and done, all the sweetness was refreshing after so very much venom in the beginning. And I liked how Cohen morphed (InstanTANeously!) into a man with a heart who was trying to become just the man River needed, or could love. Loved the inclusion of BSL (British Sign Language), and I reeeeally loved the scene with the edible ink and River’s mom on the day after THAT particular roll in the hay. And by the way, this was the slow burn kinda Romance, with nothing egregiously graphic, so Huzzah for m’ toes in no way curling in agitation.
So! If you can get through the initial Acid Dip into the most poorly written character development (With the poor choices for voices), you’ll get into smooth, and easy, and sweet, sooo sweet, easy and Suspend Your Disbelief For, Like, EVERYthing Sweet.
Did NOT recommend to Big Sis that she drop everything to Finish the story, even tho’ I did feel some relief that I could say that it got better, I got a lump in m’ throat near the end, that Hanukkah did make an appearance in spite of the Christmas-heavy activities. I liked it well enough.
It was a nice story.
If just “nice” is good enough for ya…
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