Bel Reviews: Jen E. Smith's - "The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight"

I know a good percentage of you have flown at least once, and there’s a pretty good chance than some of you, while flying, were stuck sitting next to someone you would rather not be in a confined place with for hours.

This is not the case for Hadley Sullivan when rescheduling her missed flight to London to be a bridesmaid in her Dad’s second wedding. Oliver is the young man she meets in the departure lounge and he is a cheeky young Englishman heading home for an event of his own. Neither of them really wants to be headed across the globe and they find and instant connection.

The mainly black and white cover photo by Oleg Oprisco, depicts a couple kissing on a generic city street with the double exposed images of passers-by’s around them. This gives me the impression of time standing still for the smooching pair. The font of the title alerts me to the fact that it is a story of young love and there’s a red heart drawn around the couple for emphasis.

This was an incredibly sweet book. I love the idea of meeting someone nice on a flight. Someone you can spend hours talking with and not getting the feeling you’re over sharing or sticking your foot in your mouth.

It’s set over 24 hours and has an amazing amount of depth for something with only 215 pages. I was even brought to tears at one stage.

The scene structures are simplistic but they are a fantastic backdrop for the character interaction.

There is a smallish cast until the wedding scene and it works well to give the polar opposite scenarios of isolation and privacy, compared to the crowded insanity of the celebrations.

Hadley is someone I can certainly relate to, and I was right with her through her emotional transitions of trepidation, anger, sadness, and joy. It feels mean to say, but she got on the plane as a brat and stepped out of the hotel a young woman. That’s some serious character development.

It is a challenge to find something out of place, but at a push I think there weren’t enough interruptions by the flight attendants. (See, it’s nothing)

I would say the book can easily be knocked over in an afternoon and it’s a really pleasant few hours you spend observing Hadley and Oliver as they try to figure out The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight.

Release date: January 2012

Paperback 216 pages

Published by: Headline Publishing Group

ISBN: 978 0 7553 8402 0 (978 0 7553 9217 9)

Follow Jennifer on Twitter: https://twitter.com/jenesmith