Monday, April 28, 2014

Attachments by Rainbow Rowell

I loved Eleanor and Park and Fangirl and could not wait to read this book. I certainly enjoyed the book but I did not love it like the other two.

Amazon Review
In sweet, silly, and incredibly long digital missives, best newsroom pals Beth and Jennifer trade gossip over their romances—Beth with her marriage-phobic boyfriend, Chris, and Jennifer with her baby-mania-stricken husband, Mitch. What they don't know is that the newly hired computer guy, Lincoln, an Internet security officer charged with weeding out all things unnecessary or pornographic, is reading their messages. But lonely Lincoln lets the gals slide on their inappropriate office mail and gets hooked on their soapy dalliances, falling head over heels for the unlucky-in-love Beth. Debut novelist and real-life newspaper columnist Rowell has the smarts for this You've Got Mail–like tale of missed connections, but what doesn't work so well is the firewall between the traditional narrative reserved for Lincoln's emergence from shy guy to Beth's guy, and heroines who are confined to the e-epistolary format. Despite the structural problems, there's enough heart and humor to save these likable characters from the recycle bin.

Monday, April 21, 2014

What Alice Forgot


I loved this book. I am a huge fan of this author and could not put this book down.

Amazon Summary
Alice Love is twenty-nine, crazy about her husband, and pregnant with her first child.
 
So imagine Alice’s surprise when she comes to on the floor of a gym (a gym! She HATES the gym) and is whisked off to the hospital where she discovers the honeymoon is truly over — she’s getting divorced, , she has three kids, and she’s actually 39 years old. Alice must reconstruct the events of a lost decade, and find out whether it’s possible to reconstruct her life at the same time. She has to figure out why her sister hardly talks to her, and how is it that she’s become one of those super skinny moms with really expensive clothes. Ultimately, Alice must discover whether forgetting is a blessing or a curse, and whether it’s possible to start over…

Friday, April 11, 2014

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell

Every once in a while you read a book that just makes you smile. Fangirl, is that book. Rainbow Rowell is a phenomenal author and I can't wait to read attachments now and anything else she will write in the future. I loved Eleanor and Park and I just loved loved loved Fangirl. Rowell captured what it is like to be a fan of a book and how you think and want for the characters in the book. A great author brings the characters off the page and into the readers life and heart and Rowell accomplished that. I read this book at the gym, at my desk, at the kitchen table, I couldn't stop reading and I would be lying if I said I didn't feel a little empty and sad not that I have finished the book. Two big thumbs way up. I am going to order more copies ASAP so everyone can read this book.

Amazon
At first glance Rainbow Rowell’s Fangirl has a lot in common with Eleanor & Park: idiosyncratic girl with troubled family meets good, normal boy and falls in love for the first time. But this is why Rowell is so talented--from the same basic ingredients she can create something new and special. In Fangirl, quirky introvert, Cath, is safe within the immensely popular Simon Snow (think Harry Potter) fan-fiction blog she writes with her twin sister, but college turns her life upside down, leaving her feeling like an awkward outsider. When she writes, Cath knows exactly what her characters should say to each other, but when it comes to forging real-life friendships, much less a romance, she hasn’t a clue. An immensely satisfying coming-of-age novel, Fangirl deftly captures the experience of discovering your true voice and clumsy, vulnerable, remarkable, first love

Monday, April 7, 2014

The Good Luck of Right Now by Matthew Quick

I have recently become a big fan of Matthew Quick after reading Boy 21 and Please Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock. I was very eager to read his latest novel. Ultimately, I didn't love this new book. It was a very quick read and different from anything I have ever read before but I found it to be just okay. I don't see the students relating well to the main character or the plot.

Amazon Summary
After his mother’s death, 38-year-old Bartholomew Neil, a middle-aged man who has never left home, is at a crossroads in his life. Finding a form letter from Richard Gere buried in his mother’s underwear drawer, he begins a one-sided correspondence with the superstar, triggering a series of events that culminates in a life-­altering road trip to Canada with a motley crew of misfits including his secret crush, the girlbrarian; her foulmouthed, oddball brother; and a Catholic priest who has fled his parish. The quartet travels northward in search of Bartholomew’s biological father, and humor, pathos, and quirky bends in the road define their odyssey, making it increasingly clear that it is all about the journey, not the destination.