Outline

Two people meet over the Internet; she's a columnist who writes about pet peeves; he's a chef. He e-mails her when she writes a column about Barry Manilow almost canceling a concert because of her.

She's 40, has been married once, and is now single. He's in his late 30s, has been married once and is living with someone.

I think in addition to just straight narrative, there can be lots of e-mails, and not just those between the two main characters; we can have the guy belong to a chef listserv or something and have funny e-mails from other members. We can also have complaining e-mails to the columnist and e-mails from her mother, etc. Also IMs?

For example, with the complaining e-mails, we can include the first part: "Dear blah, blah blah blah ..." then write "delete" without finishing it.

We can also include excerpts from columns -- for example, the Barry Manilow one.

I guess I'm seeing the book as mainly epistolary -- e-mails, IMs, etc.

So they e-mail and IM for awhile, then meet. Rather than writing a narrative of the meeting, we can tell about it after the fact via e-mail and IM. The book could end with one of them e-mailing a wedding chapel in Vegas to make a reservation or something.