Popular Fiction: The cream always rises and chick-lit has an increasingly rich and satisfying top layer of books by writers such as Adriana Trigiani, Marian Keyes, Melissa Bank and, now, Marisa de los Santos. They may be working within a much - and often quite rightly - maligned genre but the quality of their writing constantly threatens to push their books up into another category.
De los Santos's debut novel has the requisite corny title (in this case taken from a song by George and Ira Gershwin), a cover that just stops short of graphics of shopping bags and fizzing cocktail glasses, and a heroine with a wise-ass friend (often a gay guy but in this case female) and a "passion" for old black and white Hollywood movies, especially those starring Cary Grant. This latter is supposed to make her cute and likeable but by now it's such a galloping girly cliche that you find yourself longing for a chick-lit heroine who has a penchant for the early films of Sam Peckinpah, say, or Abel Ferrara.
Cornelia's all right in other ways, though. At 31, despite a college education, she hasn't found what she really wants to do but is marking time as the manageress of a hip coffee shop. She has a hint of Elizabeth Bennet about her - smart and kind and self-aware. She is mooning around waiting for a Cary Grant lookalike to take her away from all this but knows this is pathetic. And when the lookalike arrives she doesn't completely lose her wits.
More importantly, her search for love runs parallel to the altogether grittier story of Clare, a brave, bookish 11-year-old girl whose divorced mother is sliding into mental illness. Clare's fear and isolation - in school she pretends everything is normal at home - are well evoked, her frantic list-making (to-do lists, lists of orphans in books, of horrible people she might turn into if she "lets life make her hateful") a way of keeping some structure in a childish life that is rapidly unravelling.
De los Santos is a poet and it shows in this willingness to tackle a darker theme and the fact that on every page there are well-turned lines and astute observations like studs in the general fluff. Love Walks In gets an imprimatur on the cover from Sarah Jessica Parker whose production company has optioned the film rights. SJP may not be a heavyweight but, like Cornelia, she is smart and has taste, though in truth at 41 she is a bit old to play the role.
It may be obvious from the start that Cornelia and Clare's paths will cross, and that they are heading towards a shared sappy ending, but de los Santos has such a sweet style that you can happily turn a blind eye and enjoy making the journey with them.
Cathy Dillon is an Irish Times journalist
Love Walked In By Marisa de los Santos Penguin, 320pp. £12.99
