The Waitress by Melissa Nathan

aka when writers don't live up their first novel.

I was really looking forward to Melissa Nathan's second novel. The Nanny,her first book was great and I was eagerly anticipating the release of her second, The Waitress. Unfortunately I was really disappointed by this book. The characters are awful and the writing is dire. In fact it's so bad that I don't think I'll even be able to finish reading it.

I've just begun chapter 7 (about a third of the way through the book) and I hate the main character. I hate her best friend, i hate the love interest and I hate the random teenage secondary character. But It's the main character I hat the most.
No one with a degree from Oxford University gets any kind of sympathy from me.

It is totally unbelievable that someone with a degree form Oxford would be working as a waitress because they don't know what they want to do with their life, I don't care if does happen in real life or the author knows someone who went through the same crappy-job-crisis, it doesn't work in a book because to the average non-oxbridge educated person this is impossible. Yes, I said impossible.

Correct me if I'm wrong but to get into and graduate from Oxford University you have to be driven, determined,self disciplined and goal oriented, not some weak-arsed bitch with the emotional maturity of a damp sponge. If she'd made this character a graduate of any other university I could and would have bought the scenario, I would have found it totally plausible and believable and probably would have been able to sympathise with her. I may even have been able to relate to her on some levels. But Oxford, no bloody way.