When is the wig coming off?
Reading this book, all I could think about in every single scene is “When is he going to twig the wig?”
The plot: four graduate students in 1979 use a computer to define the perfect woman of some rich French playboy and see if they can seduce him.
None of them have long blonde hair, so one of them puts on a wig and blue contact lenses. Another girl then funds all four on a two-month skiing holiday in an ultra expensive resort (I kept wondering how much the hell this all cost, it started to stress me out) and then Fake Blonde Girl has a string of slapstick encounters with the playboy they’re stalking. Is the wig going to fall off? I MUST KNOW.
(Also: how the hell does the nerdy girl drag a 1970s computer all the way to Zermatt? How does this computer even work? Punchcards?)
Playboy gets more and more amorous, even though he seems to keep snogging other blonde women as well for half the book. Is the wig going to come off when he kisses her? Is he going to realise that her hair is actually a GREAT BLONDE SYRUP?
(Oh, and contact lenses don’t fog up. Not even the olde fashionde ones in the 1970s. Even if they did, you’d simply blink to clear them. But they don’t).
Playboy also spots her a few times without the wig. He doesn’t recognise her. She’s wearing the same ski suit. She has the same voice. She has the same face which he’s snogged countless times. But he doesn’t recognise her and doesn’t have any attraction towards her nor interest in her.
Finally – heroine bewigged again – Playboy proposes – he turns out to be a Poor Little Rich Boy – and the heroine accepts, then turns him down the next day. AND THE WIG IS OFF!!!! It’s finally off!!
Some time passes. He shows up again. Angry but amorous. Engagement is back on. At no time does he mention that he likes brunettes as much as blondes. Or at all. So one can’t really see this one lasting. As soon as the novelty of actually working for his father’s firm has worn off he’ll doubtless be off squiring blonde models and actresses again.