The Impossible Us by Sarah Lotz

Ace, 496 pages, $17

This is not a murder mystery, although there may be one or two murders revealed at the very end.

"The Impossible Us" is about Bee and Nick and their romance. Remember Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan in “You’ve Got Mail”? Remember Patricia Highsmith’s “Strangers on a Train”? Remember “Spiderman: Into the Spider-verse”? Rrrrr. That’s the sound of the tumbler tumbling all those ideas and mixing them up. Ta-dah! “The Impossible Us.”

Nick is a writer who has failed to publish a good book. He has resorted to ghostwriting and editing other people’s manuscripts. (A note: Personally, I think this is a highly honorable and difficult profession, but “The Impossible Us” seems to belittle it. It’s fiction. What can I say?) His last client, a rich posh person, has neglected to pay Nick for his recent, arduous work. So Nick fires off an irate (but caustically funny) email demanding money. The email goes astray and lands in Bee’s mailbox.

Bee has failed at a relationship (boo, hiss, Nate!) and her job keeps her indoors refashioning wedding gowns for disappointed brides. (“How about an asymmetrical jacket with a peplum?”) Until she gets Nick’s funny — to her — email, her days are dull and she has mostly neglected her social life.

You know how this is going to go, don’t you? Nick and Bee meet cute, are attracted cute, and — what’s the next step? They don’t know what the other looks like, so their attraction is based on their text exchanges. They are both good at writing their thoughts out, and soon become fluent and unselfconscious about their happiness and misery.

That takes us through quite a bit of the book. Finally it was time for the meet cute. And that takes up the rest of the book.

I am reluctant to tell you what that part of the book is about, because it’s Sarah Lotz’ secret weapon. I’ll say this: The problems Nick and Bee encounter are different, quirky, and daunting. 

Patricia Highsmith gets lots of mention. There is probably at least one murder. But that is not the focus of the book. I read one other Lotz book and she crafts a twisty plot effortlessly.

I loved this book. (Also, the "Mandela Effect" reference.)