Eleanor Oliphant, a finance clerk nearing her 30s, has worked for the same graphic design company since she graduated from college. She’s a quirky loner who struggles to navigate social situations, often making everyone around her uncomfortable with her tendency to say whatever is on her mind.
Eleanor lives her life according to a strict routine that accommodates and perpetuates her loneliness: the only people who visit her apartment are social workers and utility companies sent to read the meter, her weekends most often consist of frozen pizza and vodka, and weekly chats with Mummy are her only regular social outlet. Phone calls with Mummy are always painful and leave Eleanor feeling defeated and unworthy of love and respect.
Eleanor had a troubled childhood, but she refers to it indirectly and in vague terms because she has an imperfect, incomplete understanding of both the trauma she incurred and the impact it has on her adult life. The most visible indictor of Eleanor’s childhood trauma is a scar that stretches down the right side of her face. Eleanor states that the scar is the result of a fire, but she never goes into detail about who set the fire, and why.
One fateful day, Eleanor wins tickets to a local concert through an office raffle. While at the show, Eleanor sees and immediately falls in love with local musician Johnnie Lomond. Before she has a chance to actually meet Johnnie, Eleanor begins a series of physical self-improvements in an effort to win him over and secure a future for herself defined by romance and devoid of loneliness. The biggest supporter of Eleanor’s “project” of pursuing Johnnie is Mummy, who believes that finding a suitable husband is the only way her embarrassing disappointment of a daughter can improve her life. Eleanor transforms her physical appearance to make herself more attractive, and she purchases her first smartphone and laptop to research Johnnie’s social media presence and become better acquainted with her supposed soulmate.
After work one day, Eleanor and the new and friendly—albeit somewhat scruffy—IT guy at her office, Raymond, see an old man collapse in the middle of the street. They call an ambulance for him and later visit him at the hospital. The man, Sammy Thom, is eternally grateful to Eleanor and Raymond for saving his life, and he embraces them as family and introduces them to his children. Sammy’s daughter, Laura, a glamorous beautician and business owner, invites Eleanor and Raymond to a homecoming party for her father and, before Eleanor knows it, her life is transformed from one of routine loneliness to one of friends, parties, and unpredictability.
Eleanor grows closer to Raymond, exchanging emails and meeting up for regular lunches at a café near their office. They attend the 40th birthday party of Sammy’s son, Keith. As they drink wine together at the party, Eleanor opens up to Raymond about her abusive ex-boyfriend, Declan.
Soon, Sammy dies of a heart attack. Eleanor and Raymond attend his funeral, which makes them feel emotional and raw. After, Raymond tells Eleanor about his father’s death. Eleanor reciprocates by telling Raymond how she got her scar.
Eleanor enjoys her busy new life, but she continues her obsessive project of pursuing the musician, anxiously preparing for the day when she will finally introduce herself to him, allowing them to officially fall in love. Eventually, the big day arrives when the musician plays another gig at a local venue. Eleanor dresses up, applies makeup, and eagerly grabs a seat near the stage. As the musician performs and interacts with the crowd, Eleanor suddenly realizes he is not the perfect, sophisticated man she imagined him to be: in reality, he is an untalented, arrogant “arse.” Overcome by shame, Eleanor becomes extremely drunk. A fog machine that generates stage smoke causes Eleanor to suffer a nervous breakdown in which she has flashbacks to the fire, and she runs outside to escape.
The next thing Eleanor knows, she’s lying naked in her apartment, surrounded by empty vodka bottles. She continues to drink and make plans to kill herself. Before Eleanor can go through with her plans, Raymond appears at her door, concerned after she fails to show up at work for three days.
With Raymond’s help, Eleanor overcomes her alcohol dependence and starts seeing a therapist. At first, Eleanor is skeptical of therapy’s ability to fix her problems, but her therapist, Dr. Temple, eventually helps Eleanor come to terms with her past. Over the course of her therapy sessions, Eleanor talks to Dr. Temple about her experiences in foster care, her abusive mother, and her younger sister, Marianne, who perished in the fire that Mummy started to kill both Marianne and Eleanor. Dr. Temple helps Eleanor understand and overcome the shame and guilt she carries with her as a result of her traumatic childhood and gives her the strength to sever contact with her cruel mother.
Eleanor returns to work after taking a medical leave of absence, and her coworkers greet her warmly. For much of the novel, Eleanor insists on not knowing about her past, preferring to ignore the things that are too painful for her to confront. By the end, though, Eleanor decides she is ready to discuss and know the whole truth about what happened to her. With Raymond’s help, Eleanor finds two newspaper articles about the incident. She reads the articles and discovers that Marianne and Mummy perished in the fire, and that her years of weekly chats with Mummy never really happened.
Raymond asks Eleanor how she’s feeling. For once in her life, Eleanor says she’s “fine,” and she means it. Still, Eleanor knows that she has a lot of things to unpack, and she decides to continue seeing Dr. Temple. She and Raymond part ways, and he tells her he’ll see her soon.
