2008

Barefoot:A Novel

2008, Books in Bed, Chick Lit, Fiction, Women /

Barefoot is chick lit and it is also cancer chick lit. Always a good combination. What I appreciated about this one was the fact that the other two women, the cancer free women, were in more trouble than the chick with the cancer. Awesome. I mean, in a novel it makes for awesome reading.

You don’t spend the whole book commiserating over the poor mom of babies who has cancer. Instead you’re distracted by the pregnant chick whose husband is a dirtbag, the young professor who not only slept with her student but damaged a Jackson Pollack and the teenage boy whose mom killed herself when he was 12. Awesome.

Also it was a little bit long. And it didn’t have chapters. It was divided by month – June, July and August and then Winter. And those summer months were long, long, long. I need chapters, darn it.

Looking for good cancer chick lit – Barefoot will fit the bill.

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Sequestered Hearts

1 Comment / 2008, Books in Bed, Chick Lit, Favorites, Queer, Women /

When I picked up Sequesterd Hearts from TW’s side of the bed and asked her if she’d finished with it, she asked me why I was going to read it. I couldn’t figure out why she asked until I realized she thought it was just a trashy romance novel. It is a trashy romance novel but it is also a trashy lesbian romance novel and that’s why I wanted to read it. We lesbians just don’t get enough trashy romance in our lives, ya know?

And it was good. Fun and not depressing, and it could have been very depressing since one of the chicks is an artist recently diagnosed with MS.

I’m glad I read it.

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Options: The Secret Life of the Fake Steve Jobs

1 Comment / 2008, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction /

hahahaha. I can’t even type the title of the book without laughing which shouldn’t really be a surprise because everything about The Fake Steve Jobs has always amused me. I’m so glad Options didn’t disappoint.

I’m not an Apple fan, but I love my iPhone and my big kids love their iPod Touch. I’ve never longed for a MacBook but I have purchased one for two of the big kids because they had to have them. I did have an Apple computer, way back in the late 70s and early 80s and never did switch to Commodore like most of the cool kids. Then the PC explosion arrived and I never looked at Apple again.

But something about The Fake Steve Jobs makes me want to toss aside my Toshiba Tablet PC for a MacBook. (Don’t worry little Tablet, I still love you and I’m not going to give into those horrible urges.) I twittered about that the other day and my friends and co-workers and former coworkers reminded me that it’s because I love satire and sarcasm. Right on.

That’s why I like Gates better than the real Jobs and the Fake Jobs better than both of them.

Whatever.

The book was awesome. You should read it.

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Me and Mr Darcy

2 Comments / 2008, Books in Bed, Chick Lit, Don't Read This, Fiction, Women /

Oh brother. Why did I read Me and Mr Darcy? Oh yea, I wanted something quick and easy and light. Well this was all of those things. It was also pretty boring, pretty predictable and pretty ridiculous.

Do Jane Austen or Mr Darcy fans enjoy this sort of thing? Sassymonkey? I am pretty sure you read this but don’t remember whether you liked it or not. I sort of doubt that you did.

Yuk.

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Biting the Apple

2008, Books in Bed, Fiction, Queer, Women /

Hey! Biting the Apple was good. Surprisingly good. I was a little bit afraid it was going to be like the Mt Joy book I read last month, not that it was bad but imagining that book with a lesbian twist seemed kind of frightening. But wait, now that I’m really thinking about it – there are some strong similarities between the books.

The beautiful high school goddess turned author/personality/inspiration has a guy from high school willing to drop everything when she gets into trouble and help her out.

Interesting. Now that I think about it.

Anyway, it was good. I enjoyed it.

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The Double Bind

2008, Books in Bed, Fiction, Women /

Ya know. It’s stuff like this that makes me vow never to read another book by an author again. HMPH. Was that ending really necessary? No. It wasn’t. I don’t care that some people probably loved it. Thought it was the perfect “double bind“. I thought it stunk. Right up until the last 20 pages, I was loving the book.

I like(d) Chris Bohjalian’s books and his blog. It will be a long time before I read either. I don’t trust him anymore.

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May Bird: Among the Stars

1 Comment / 2008, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Favorites, Fiction, Sci Fi and Fantasy, Young Adult /

For some reason I think Karen’s friend Kit Cat did not like the other books in the May Bird series and I’m wondering why. But I don’t have time to surf her blog to find out if I’m imagining that or why she didn’t like them. Maybe I’ll get caught up enough at work later today and figure it out. Or maybe not. Whatever.

I liked Among the Stars (book two) a lot. I’m so glad her mom ummm would that ruin the story if I said what I’m glad her mom did or did not do? Probably, so I won’t say anything. Very glad mom did what she did. Also glad about Beatrice’s mom. I’m just glad about the moms in the story, in general. Also glad about the good characters who aren’t all good and the bad characters who aren’t all bad.

I just like these books. Enough to stay up far too late in order to finish book 2 just a few hours after I started it. heh.

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It’s All Too Much

2008, Books in Bed, Non-Fiction /

As much as I really enjoy watching Clean Sweep on TLC and as much as I appreciated the gift of “keep, sell, trash” signs and tarps given to me by the small children a few years ago, I just did not love Peter Walsh’s It’s All Too Much.

It’s not a bad book, I just think Walsh is better in person than he is in a book. Too many exclamation marks. He said “you don’t know this or you wouldn’t be reading this book” or “you don’t believe this or you wouldn’t be reading this book” or something like that about a zillion times. And really, he’s wrong. And even if/when he isn’t, it just was not necessary to say it over and over and over again in the first five chapters of the book.

I liked it much better when he quit with the psycho-analysis and preachy stuff and moved into the “this is how you de-clutter this space” sections.

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The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

2008, Books in Bed, Children's Literature, Fiction, Young Adult /

Could the title have been any longer for The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian? I think it’s a little much. I also think the hype for this book is a little much.

It’s a good book. I enjoyed it. But it has gotten a lot of press and a lot of really great reviews from YA critics. I’m very glad the Cybil judges didn’t make it the YA winner, Wednesday Wars was better (though Off Season was not.)

Anyway – it’s about a kid on an Indian reservation who is smart, really smart. A teacher advises him to get off the Rez – now. So he does – by going to the white school in town. This leads to any number of problems, but also a lot of good things. Maybe it gets so many rave reviews because we don’t see a lot of books about teen Indians on reservations? Whatever. It was good but not great. Read it but don’t buy it. And if your kids are assigned the book and don’t fall in love with it, don’t be surprised by that.

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Breathing Underwater

2008, Books in Bed, Fiction, Queer, Women /

Where did Breathing Underwater come from? I know I saw it on a blog and was pleasantly surprised that my library had it. (Another example of oddness – they have this obscure lesbian stuff but not Lauren Willig’s books.)

Anyway, it was a very fast read and more than a little odd. The drowning thing – crazy. But then again, the whole town is crazy so I guess it only makes sense. I liked Lily, bless her heart. I liked that they brought in the black lesbian to help her sort herself out. I’m glad she figured out that she and Rae didn’t want the same things.

I think I liked the book. But I didn’t love it.

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