I love the way Ann Patchett wrote the flashbacks intermittently throughout related scenes - the plane scene early on in the book was particularly great. It felt like she wrote this amazing character who did a lot of growing... and then didn't learn a lot from it. I was a let down by the MC's determination to hold onto her naivete, and maybe even to learn the wrong things? Also, while I constantly witness how little women seem to expect from the men they date, the romantic interest feels forced, and the dude is laaaaaaaame. I thought we were being set up from the beginning to dislike him, because he was lame from the very start, but the badass 45-year old doctor was still worried about what he thought after the whole book was done. whyyyy.