Emily and Einstein

December 20, 2010
Lee (The Devil in Junior League) returns with a quick yet extremely predictable story of betrayal and atonement. Sandy Portman and Emily Barlow seem to lead a perfect life. Sandy is a successful businessman from an old-money family, and Emily, beautiful and smart, is quickly gaining respect in her career as a book editor. But Sandy is keeping a few secrets from Emily, and is hit by a car and killed before he has a chance to reveal the truth. In a Dickensian turn of events, he's given an otherworldly chance to make amends as a dog named Einstein. Emily adopts Einstein and he bears witness as she discovers Sandy's former duplicity, causing her life to fall apart and leaving Einstein to figure out how to save her so that he can save himself. These turns of events also reveal the novel's most frustrating aspect: an utter lack of surprise.

The best thing about this predictable novel is the clever performances by Dan John Miller and Cassandra Campbell. Miller employs a suitably smooth, arrogant tone for Sandy, a rich and shallow New Yorker who is about to ask his wife, Emily, for a divorce when he's hit by a car and killed. Much to his humiliation, Sandy finds himself in the body of an ugly dog named Einstein and is charged with making amends. Campbell's Emily is more appealing. Emily is shocked to discover that her husband wasn't an honorable man. Campbell creates multiple characters, including Emily's seductively voiced but bullying boss, Titania; her wild and unpredictable younger sister, Jordan; and her upper-class mother-in-law, who wants to evict Emily from her home. A fluffy novel is vastly improved by appealing narrators. A.B. 2012 Audies Finalist (c) AudioFile 2012, Portland, Maine