The Romance Reader
The heroine of this novel, Rachel Walsh, finds herself in a similar situation albeit in a different setting. Rachel is a 27-year-old drug addict. Okay, she's not REALLY a drug addict. As she says,
"They said I was a drug addict. I found that hard to come to terms with - I was a middle class, convent-educated girl whose drug use was strictly recreational. And surely drug addicts were thinner? I wasn't thin. Instead, I was doomed for people always to describe me by saying, "She's a big girl." Then they always added really quickly, "Now, I'm not saying she's fat." The implication being that if I was fat, I could at least do something about it."True drug addict or not, Rachel finds herself headed for The Cloisters and Irish inpatient drug rehabilitation program, after she accidentally overdoses on drugs in the New York City apartment that she shares with her best friend. Rachel insists she doesn't have a serious drug problem, but she agrees to The Cloisters because she's heard that plenty of Irish celebrities go there to "dry out". She figures it will be an easy way to get a free holiday complete with massages, spas and health food. And at least her family - her clueless parents, two older and two younger sisters - will get off her back.
To Rachel's surprise, The Cloisters turns out to be a run-down facility with a noticeable lack of luxuries and celebrities. Instead, she has to deal with early morning kitchen duty, cooking class, and a confrontational drug rehab counsellor who has little tolerance for the addict's denial. Like Goldie Hawn, Rachel must be in the wrong rehab centre!
The ultimate horror of The Cloisters is when ISO's - Involved Significant Others such as parents or spouses - come to group meetings to confront their loved ones about the details of their addiction. Rachel is in luck there. She's been living in New York for years, so her parents will have few horrible details to impart. And surely Luke, her ex-boyfriend, won't bother to fly across the Atlantic just to rat on her, will he? Who needs him, anyway -- just because he was kind, sexy and funny. He was totally uncool and quite dreadful at the end, breaking up with Rachel just because she liked to have a little fun sometimes. There are plenty of other guys to tumble into bed with - in fact, there's fellow Cloisters resident Chris, who is handsome and attentive.