One Hundred Names: A Novel Paperback – May 6, 2014

This is an amazing writer. Her characters are so evolved that one quickly becomes invested in the story. This is one of her best books. While you'll often want to throttle the heroine, you'll be engaged the entire time.

At first, I couldn't even get what the premise of the story was. I felt that the storytelling was a little looseygoosey at the beginning, and I felt in the dark about what was going on. Finally, when a little humor was injected into Kitty's predicament, I got the message that there was going to be more to come, and I read on in confidence that I might be following a good story here. Also, I had read The Time of My Life by the same author and greatly liked that story.What happens as Kitty tries to put together any threads that might tie together the lives of the people on the list of 100 names left to her by her editor, whom she greatly admired, is a roller coaster of a story.Not only are the people who she finds available to speak to her in varying places in their lives, but she too is in a very precarious situation. Some of the folks she meets, however, are content with the place they find themselves at when she meets them. So what can possibly tie them together on this list?IIt makes an intriguing story to follow.Toward the end, I thought there were almost too many characters to manage to wrap the story up, and I did believe it got somewhat confusing.But the message came through in a strong way, and a very gratifying and heartwarming message it was.In all, a success of a story.

Although this book has a frustrating my slow start, it tells a satisfying story of a young woman who discovers the meaning of good journalism.

I’ve often thought along similar lines for a novel (i.e. campers at a campground, residents of a nursing home, small business owners in an isolated community, first year teachers, lottery winners, etc.). Ahern brings to the forefront that each one of us has a story that must be shared to teach lessons of hurt, grief, desire, compassion, empathy, love, humility, and more. She reminds us to exchange conversation with our extended families, to speak with strangers beyond the passer-by’s “Hello,” to be inquisitive of lives other than our own, and to share our own stories with anyone who will listen. She brings order to our chaos and reason to our confusion. Brilliant author of the ordinary turned extraordinary. You will not be able to ignore the intended nudge of her challenge to each of us. Precious.

Much like her heroine, Cecelia Ahern always has a story to tell. And every time, it is a story about ordinary people in unordinary circumstances. Some of the circumstances are familiar. The emotions she evokes with her words often move me to tears at one point or another. Her viewpoints are unique. I fell in love with her writing with the first book of hers I read. ‘If You Could See Me Now’ was also a plotless story that took me an awareness that transcended reality, but true none-the-less.

I am so glad I took the time to read this book !Usually I read biographies and was looking for a light book to just relax with....First off this is ....Not another love story....True it starts off with the heroine in despair over a stupid decision she made and too many pages of her angst...But once past all that it developed into a delightful story full of characters that were well developed and I came to care about...The story goes in unexpected directions and the ending while expected is well done.....If you are in the mood for a delightful time spent with characters you will be glad you had a chance to meet and read their stories I would recommend giving this book a try.

This is a wonderful book that reminds us all of a very important part of life. (If I discuss that here, I will give away too much of the book, so I won't.) Kitty is having a rough time - both personally and professionally. She has promised her friend/mentor (who is dying) that she will finish the friend's last writing/research project for her. However, the friend passes away before telling Kitty exactly what that project is. All Kitty has is a list of 100 names. She now has to find out what there is about these people that her friend wanted to write about. While doing this, she learns much about herself -- and life in general.

I absolutely adored this book. Such an interesting concept brought to life. I was rooting for Kitty and really hoping she found the link and wrote an amazing worthy story. I would have read a book 94x longer that included everyone on the list I loved it that much!

There are books of Cecelia Aherns that I LOVE - such as 'A place called here', 'If you could see me now', and 'Thanks for the memories' and those I have not enjoyed at all, such as 'The Gift', 'Book of tomorrow' etc. So I read this with some trepidation and for me this is one of the ones to keep, I loved this.The story for this is that a called journalist Kitty has been through the mill - she managed to land a job on a small tv show and followed a story two women concocted about being abused by their PE teacher - she eagerly follows it and accuses the man on TV, and it turns out the story was false. The man lost his job and his marriage has been affected, but all Kitty can think of is how her life has been ruined - the TV show has sacked her, her boyfriend leaves her, people have found out where she lives and smear dog poo on her door on a daily basis, and she has lost all hope in herself. She turns to Constance, her old mentor at the newspaper she used to work at who ensures she has a job. But Constance is dying and Kitty is given a list of names, to use as her next story, Constance promises her she will let her know what this story was about when she next visits, but she deteriorates and dies with no explanation.Kitty throws herself into researching the names, and finds a bunch of ordinary people with ordinary stories, but she continues with interviewing them and realises each one of them have led interesting lives and realises that it is what in on the inside that counts and not the outside, as she develops bonds with these people.This is a feel good book, much like a christmas film, and it was lovely to read throughout. I would recommend this to all of Aherns fans, and yes, it doesn't have 'magic' or a touch of the extraordinary like some of her books do, but I feel this book didn't actually need it.

In One Hundred Names by Cecelia Ahern we meet Kitty Logan a Journalist whose recently had what she thought would be her big break into TV journalism. But it went horribly wrong when Kitty wrongly accused Colin McGuire, a PE Teacher of having inappropriate relationships with students.After this disaster and with its on going ramifications Kitty tries to reconnect with her Journalistic roots. She seeks advice from Constance her mentor, editor and friend who has terminal cancer. As they talk in the hospital room; Kitty is struck by an idea to ask Constance:What's the one story you have always wanted to write?Constance promises to tell Kitty her story idea; once Kitty brings a file entitled `Names' from her office to her.But before Kitty has chance to bring Constance the file she passes away. Kitty is left with a list of one hundred names - nothing else about what the story is about or how these names are connected and two weeks to write Constance's story.Kitty soon meets six of the hundred names starting with Birdie. Birdie is an eighty-four year old who lives in a home and has her eighty-fifth birthday coming up. Her eighty-fifth birthday will be an extra special and she won't be spending it with her family, instead she's opting to go on a trip. Kitty finds out why this birthday is extra special by listening to Birdie tell her life story.Next Kitty meets Eva Wu who is Personal Shopper with a difference. Eva Wu specialises in gift giving; she spends time with her clients and the intended recipients before choosing the right gift. Eva chooses gifts that emotionally touch the recipients: repairing relationships, bringing closure and reuniting people with long forgotten parts of their lives . Yet she is very closed about herself and where these precious skills come from.Jedrek is the next name on the list that Kitty meets. Jedrek along with his friend Archar want to break the World Record for how fast two people can peddle a distance on a peddle boat - and in practices they've beat the record! But they need an official adductor to come to Ireland from London, which both being unemployed they cant afford to pay for. Why have Jedrek and Archar put so much time, effort and energy into this record attempt?Kitty meets Mary-Rose a young woman who looks after her disabled mother and spends time doing the hair and make-up of patients at the Hospital. Kitty meets Mary-Rose and Sam one of her friends in a restaurant. Sam proposes to Mary-Rose and Kitty sees a glimmer of sadness in Mary-Rose's eyes. Kitty learns that he proposes all the time to raise the atmosphere and to get a few free drinks.Kitty struggles to interview Ambrose an eccentric, shy and elusive owner of a Butterfly Sanctuary. A woman with a large discoloured mark on her face initially talks to Kitty through her hair; having not been seen in public for a number of years. Instead she trusts Eugene a butterfly enthusiast and loyal friend as her voice in the world outside of her home.Kitty constantly chases Archie, but he is more elusive of Ambrose. He's had bad experiences with the press following a tragedy and is now convinced that he can hear people's prayers.Can Kitty discover the link between these six seemingly diverse people that Constance had? With the help of Steve, her friend since college she sets out to do just that.Ahern brings all of the characters to life with her unique writing style; but although the storyline was well paced, it left a lot to be desired. Despite logically knowing that it would be impossible for Kitty to meet all of the one hundred people listed in two weeks, I felt misled by the title.In comparison to Ahern's previous novels One Hundred Names lacked the hint of magic that The Gift, The Book of Tomorrow, If You Could See Me Now and The Time of My Life all shared. It was simliar to PS, I Love You in the sense that it close to reality. However PS, I Love You was an extraordinary read filled with emotional depth; whereas One Hundred Names felt mundane read with no emotional depth.Overall One Hundred Names by Cecelia Ahern was a reasonable concept but was poorly executed.

This is the first of Cecelia Ahern's novels I have read since the release of P.S. I Love You. And it's not that I haven't tried, I did try to get in to a few but none of them were ever able to hold my attention. Before going on holiday this summer I added One Hundred Names to my TBR pile and started it on the plane journey home.The story follows Kitty as she attempts to save her career as a journalist after a story gone wrong threatens to end it. The death of Kitty's friend and mentor Constance sparks the story as a list of one hundred names is the story that Constance never had the chance to write. With no leads to go on and no connections established with any of the names Kitty must cold call and turn up on door steps in order to save herself.The story starts quickly as Kitty's career meltdown is explored straight away, as well as her friendship with Constance. Their relationship appears believable and I think this in part is what held my interest; this along with the mystery of list of names kept me reading.Kitty's character is easy to like however, I felt like I never really go to know her properly, as although the story is told from her point of view there is a lot of narrative about the list of names, as you would expect, but this kind of left Kitty's character a bit under established. Her story didn't seem to shine and have an overall presence above the stories of the characters she contacted from the list of names.Kitty manages to successfully contact 6 names from the list, as she meets each of the characters their stories begin to unfold. The stories of each character are different to the next and also to Kitty's. I think this is where some of her character gets lost.The idea in itself is interesting and the overriding message from the book is that everyone has a story to tell. I agree with this but would have liked to see a bit more of Kitty and maybe a name from the list that had some connection to her own life.Erin x

To me, Cecelia Ahern's stories tend to end up in one of two categories - "I love it" or "I hate it". For instance, I loved PS I Love You and Where Rainbows End, but have not been so keen on many of her later books. But the storyline in the product description made me want to take a chance and whilst I didn't love it, I certainly liked it for the most part.Katherine "Kitty" Logan's journalism career is in disarray after she presents an accusation about a local teacher as true when it turns out not be the case and her mentor at the magazine where she works loses her battle with cancer. Kitty is given the opportunity to write up Constance's final story (the story she wished she had wrote) as part of a tribute as one last chance to prove herself in her career, but all she has to go on from is a list of one hundred names. Kitty sets about finding the one hundred people and finding out why they were selected for a story whilst also dealing with the implications of her earlier mistake.Kitty and the characters she meets do have some interesting stories and are likeable. The story has a good flow to it and if you have a couple of hours to spare, it is quite easy to get engrossed in the story without realising just how much you've read. And then I got to what made me choose a four star rating instead of five... the ending. Without giving too much away, it is almost as if Cecelia Ahern could not think of an appropriate or better ending. I mean, it is harmless enough and I suppose it fitted in with the general message that Kitty eventually realised that was what Constance wanted to cover in her story. I guess that I was just looking for something a bit more substantial considering that Kitty was constantly trying to spot the link between the people she meets. Other than that, I thoroughly enjoyed the story and my view of the ending does not change how I felt about the rest of the book.Cecelia Ahern's stories do tend to have an element of fantasy about them - people that you can relate to but some of the issues in the story just would not happen in real life - and this is no different. Nothing wrong with that, this book is a nice bit of escapism and considering I finished this book in 36 hours, I did like this book a lot. Certainly up there as being one of her better books and is an ideal read if you are looking for something light-hearted and that is easy to follow.

Cecelia Ahern does it again. I have been a big fan of this author since I read her first book years ago. Since then, she has written many more and had films made from her stories. One Hundred Names is a typical Ahern book and by typical, I mean that it is funny, sad and heart-warming with a bit of magic thrown in.The story follows Kitty Logan, a journalist whose name is mud, thanks to her falsely accusing an innocent man on TV. Her boss is ill with cancer and Kitty asks her what story she wanted to write but never got round to and her boss presents her with a list of 100 names. Kitty then sets off to find these 100 people to interview and find out their stories.This all leads to a funny set of people and situations and these all make the story what it is ......heart-warming. The characters are clearly presented and they all have very individual characters that will keep you interested all the way through.I enjoyed reading this over a weekend and as I had the Kindle version, the print is not tiny and easy to read. The only reason that I didn't give this book 5 stars is because I am comparing it to her other books, some of which I prefer, but as a stand-alone read, this is great and a really good introduction to Ahern's writing.