BOOKIN' IT: Summer 2011

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Summer went by in a blur. Our schedule was blissfully filled with baseball games, trips to the pool, visits with friends, and grilling veggie burgers, so I'm surprised that I was able to slip in a few really good (and not so good...okay, HORRIBLE) reads here and there. But when it comes to books, I think we all know, I make the time!!

Here are my sizzlin' summer reads and one that is just outright burn-worthy:

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STAR RATINGS CHART
5 : Effing Awesome, Walking-Into-Lamposts
4 : Pretty Sweet Read, I Dug It
3 : Meh, Just Average, Next...
2 : Ugh, Struggled, Not Really Worth the Time
1 : Suckass, Still Trying to Forget
0 : The Worst Book I've Ever Read! 'Nuff said.
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One Day by David Nicholls
Vintage Contemporaries, 2009
435 pages
Read - June 9, 2011
5 Stars 

I found myself completely absorbed in this Hornby-esque tale of boy meets girl.  Completely touching, but not obnoxiously sentimental. However, it is possible it might totally flatten the overly sensitive. I was still thinking about this book weeks after I closed its cover. Bonus: it also has a ton of literary references (Book Nerd Alert!). I'm still dying to see the movie, but *sigh* the reviews have not been overly favorable. Eh, I'm sure I've seen worse. Bring on British Hathaway!

A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
Alfred A. Knopf, 2010
274 pages
Read - June 15, 2011
4 Stars

If there was a special circle of Hell devoted to washed up hipsters, this would be their reading material. Now, that may seem like I didn't like the book. I did...and not just because it won the Pulitzer this year. (After all, that criteria didn't help me with Tinkers.) I really enjoyed the way each story was written in a unique style, yet flowed so nicely from story to story. I was entertained by the famous 'Power Point chapter' and amused by many of the characters (see: Kissing Mother Superior, incompetent, hairball, poppy seeds, on the can.). Also, using the music industry to tie the stories together was wicked cool and made the music industry seem like another character in the story, if not the main character. Ultimately, I walked away with the moral of the story(ies) being 'life sucks and then you die,' which left me feeling a little pummeled. If that sounds like your bag, baby, pick it up.

The Help by Kathryn Stockett
Amy Einhorn Books/Putnam, 2009
444 pages
Read - June 20, 2011
5 Stars

I didn't actually expect to like this book. I basically picked it up because the movie was coming out and all my friends had already read it. I thought it would be a bit unbelievable, somewhat infuriating, and totally predictable. And it was. However, it must have hit me at the right moment because I devoured it in only a few sittings. Despite my 5-star rating, I don't think I'll be raving about this book for years to come or anything. But for those looking for an unputdownable summer read, this one definitely fits the bill.

We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver
Counterpoint, 2003
400 pages
Read - June 27, 2011
4 Stars

Holy eff!!! We Need to Talk About Kevin is like the supreme argument for birth control. No, STERILIZATION! Seriously, I can't imagine anything worse than having Kevin as a child. I was HORRIFIED as I read and, I'm a little ashamed to admit, gave my kids a few wayward stares, as if they were going to spontaneously turn into this monster child. To say that this book completely freaked me out would be putting it mildly. To say that it gave me nightmares AND daymares would be much more accurate. Also, I had that Foster the People song playing on a loop in my head the entire time I read, which didn't help matters. Yikes! (I've seen clips for the movie and it looks terrifyingly good.)

The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Translated from the Russian by Richard Pevear & Larissa Volokhonsky
Vintage Classics, 1868
615 pages
Read - June 30, 2011
5 Stars

Fyodor Dostoevsky is like my big Russian daddy. He can really do no wrong in my eyes and The Idiot did not disappoint. There was an all-star cast of characters, but Prince Myshkin absolutely stole my heart. He was wonderfully pure and simple without ever being boring (I'm looking at you, Fanny Price!). 

I initially docked this book half a star because I felt it wasn't quite as captivating as The Brothers Karamazov, but since I still had lingering thoughts about it months later, I decided I had been too hasty and bumped it up to 5-stars. At the very minimum, it's a 5-star soap opera! This one is definitely going onto my reread pile. Did you hear that Prince Myshkin? I'm coming back for youuuuuu!

Regarding the translation: do Pevear/Volokhonsky or don't bother reading it at all.

The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea by Yukio Mishima
Translated from the Japanese by John Nathan
Perigee Books, 1963
181 pages
Read - July 7, 2011
3 Stars

Goooooood grief! This was such a disturbing little book. I thought the whole hive mind/gang aspect was fascinating. The kids are definitely NOT alright. Perhaps I read this a little too soon after finishing We Need to Talk About Kevin, because this felt a bit flat. Am I becoming jaded to the horrifying? Well, that's pretty unsettling!!

84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff
Moyer Bell, 1970
97 pages
Read - July 17, 2011
5 Stars

Reading 84, Charing Cross Road has OFFICIALLY made it into my All-Time Greatest Reading Memories. Forget for a second that it is a charming, little epistolary book ABOUT books and book lovers. That is enough to make it awesome in its own right. However, the setting in which I read it made it truly magical.

It was a slightly cool summer day and I had a completely free afternoon (which RARELY happens), so I decided to swing by the public library and wander around the stacks. I picked up a few books that I had heard good things about, including 84, Charing Cross Road. Armed with a stack of good reads that I was anxious to dive into, and not being in any rush to get home, I decided to head over to the coffee shop across the street. For the rest of the day, I sat on the coffee shop patio, sipping Americanos, reading 84, Charing Cross Road cover to cover, and occasionally glancing over at the people walking in and out of the library, their bags bulging with books.

That was one of the most blissfully delicious afternoons I've had in recent memory and I really hope to recreate it one day. I get butterflies just thinking about it! Does it really get any better than that?? *sigh*

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
Penguin Classics, 1876
221 pages
Read - July 18, 2011
4 Stars

Let me start by saying that I adore Mark Twain. He is one of the wittiest people of all time and his books define "classics." Now, let me say that I think Tom Sawyer is a little punk and I'd love to knock the smirk off his smug little face. Yes, Tom makes think violent thoughts. This was actually a reread from my dewey-eyed youth. I fawned all over Tom and Huck back in the day, but while my rereading of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn a few years ago made me love it all the more, Tom Sawyer ended up falling a notch in my eyes. Those shenanigans don't fly with me now that I'm perpetually in Mommy Mode. Still, I found myself cracking a smile many, many times. That Mark Twain...

Room by Emma Donoghue
Little, Brown and Company, 2010
321 pages
Read - July 19, 2011
3 Stars

The saving grace of this book was the perspective of the narrator, a 5-year-old boy, otherwise, its almost like a Lifetime movie from start to finish. Almost sickeningly poignant, heart-wrenching, and overwrought. That's basically what it boils down to. Yes, it totally pulled at my heartstrings, but I felt a little cheap afterward...kinda like when I find myself watching Lifetime movies.

Colin Preston Rocked and Rolled by Bert Murray
Davanna Books, 2010
251 pages
Read - July 24, 2011
0 Stars

*** Warning: The following review contains references to sex. Not good sex, mind you, but still, sex. ***

Yes, 0 Stars!!!!

While it is never very pleasant to write a bad review, it even less pleasant to read a bad book. And this book is the WORST book I've ever read!

All other books are masterpieces in comparison. Horrible writing. Horrible characters. Horrible dialogue. Horrible plot line. Horrible layout. There really was NOTHING redeemable about this book at all. I would read excerpts to my husband and he would laugh his ass off (when he wasn't groaning from the agony). The only people who could possibly give this book higher than one star have to be the author's family and friends...or people who are being heavily compensated...or people who have guns to their heads. I mean, there is NO WAY that anyone who has read any other book in existence could possibly think this is any good. 

Yes, it is THAT bad.

Here are some lowlights:

CHARACTERS

In short, they are all terrible.

* The main character, Colin Preston talks incessantly about the Beatles. He drops every bit of information he knows about them in everyday conversations, corrects other people's misinformation about them, and listens to every album by them (and John Lennon's solo work) constantly. I'm not sure there is a page where there ISN'T a Beatles reference. I loooooooove the Beatles, but this was almost enough to make me not want to listen to them ever again, just so I wouldn't have to have any association to this horrible main character. Plus, he's whiny, naïve, and annoying. I hate him.

* The main character's love interest, Jasmine is a complete contradiction. Not even believable in the slightest. She's supposed to be a super hot, (of course!...and ALL of the girls in the book are super hot with smokin' bodies who want to have sex with these dweebs the second they meet them...believable, no?) hippie chick who is very into all-natural foods, yoga, Jim Morrison (almost as much as Colin is into the Beatles...gah!), and smoking pot. HOWEVER, she smokes cigarettes (what?! so much for her all-natural persona), has extreme mood swings (like a 24-hour roller coaster ride with Sybil at the switch), and can be very violent (throws beer bottles at Colin). None of these behaviors match her purported Zen-like nature. Oh, and she's a slut.

* Colin's best friend, Karl is a complete caricature of a big man on campus. Football star, ladies' man
panty-dropper, and all-around prick. He cares about very little other than playing sports and banging hos. He's a class act.

* Chester is the quintessential loner and loser. He hangs out in the dorm basement ALL THE TIME and smokes a ton of weed. He has very obvious mental problems and says a lot of extremely weird things. Other characters refer to him as highly intelligent, but I never heard him say anything remotely smart. He ends up having a mental breakdown (SHOCKING!!) and goes to rehab for cocaine (which was NEVER mentioned in the story previously), mushrooms, and pot (WHAT?!? Rehab for 'shrooms and pot?! C'mon!). He writes a very bizarre letter from rehab that makes you think a psychiatric facility would be a much better fit for him.

* Mrs. Vesquez, one of the professors at the school, gets brought into the story, inexplicably. One day Colin is being nasty to her because he's having a bad day, the next day they are hanging out and he's dishing out all his problems to her. For the rest of the book, she doles out advice and wisdom, talks about the hardships of her life, and listens as Colin whines nonstop about Jasmine. Sure, because that's the shit professors live for!

* Big Ty is basically the token black friend in the book. He doesn't really have much to do with the plot other than inviting the guys to multiple frat parties.

PLOT POINTS

There are soooo many things that don't make any sense that it would take me all day and night to list them. I could easily go page by page of this preposterous story, trying to figure it all out, but I don't really think it deserves that kind of time/effort. However, I will provide a few head-scratchers for you and maybe you can tell me if these things make sense or could ever happen in real life.

* Colin and Jasmine are getting all hot and heavy in Colin's room. She desperately wants to have sex with him. He goes to put on a condom. He puts it on inside out. (How?) He puts on another condom. They start having sex. It feels good and he is ready to come, but he holds back. She starts to come...very loudly! He begins counting Beatles albums to keep from coming. She finishes with a cacophony of screams, moans, and bed squeaking. He pretends that he came, too, and then throws the empty condom in the trash.

-- If the girl is letting you know that she is having an orgasm, why would you hold back and then fake it? I can understand holding back until she gets to that point, but once she's there, why in the world would any guy purposely NOT come...and then lie that he did? I'm sorry, but I cannot think of any plausible reason why that would happen.

* Colin is at a frat party without Jasmine. He is persuaded by cool guy Karl to ask a hot chick to dance. As he and hot girl are dancing, she suddenly stops and looks upset. Apparently, her boyfriend is not happy to see her dancing with another guy. Colin turns to see a "beefy meathead with bulging biceps" approaching in a jealous rage. The beefy meathead boyfriend grabs a beer from a random guy and throws "the contents" in Colin's face.

-- Huh?? Maybe my imagination is not what it used to be, but when would a muscular guy, in a jealous rage, EVER grab a beer and throw "the contents" in someone's face?? Maybe they would throw a beer bottle at someone's face (or break it over their head), but I cannot picture them grabbing a "cup of beer" and throwing it in someone's face like someone out of a soap opera. Picture Ronnie from Jersey Shore doing that.

* Colin is at a frat party. He runs into his friend, Big Ty, who invited him to the frat party. Colin immediately asks Big Ty how his grandmother is doing. Big Ty tells him that she is keeping him busy, but she did find a new doctor she likes. Then, Colin asks about her blood pressure. Big Ty tells him that it is better because she's been taking her medication.

-- I don't care HOW good of friends you are with someone, two guys at a frat party would NEVER be discussing a grandmother's blood pressure. Not possible.

WRITING/LAYOUT

Again, I could go on and on. The writing is the worst I've ever seen in my history as a reader. Each page is worst than the last. Here are a few examples:

* Bizarre chapter layout. Most of the chapters are no more than a couple pages. Frequently, a chapter will end in the middle of a fight, conversation, etc. and then pick right back up at the start of the next chapter. If this was the author's idea of cliff hangers, then I give him a big FAIL.

* Lighted. Used over and over and over again. As in, "he lighted a joint and began smoking" and "Jasmine pulled a cigarette out of her bag and lighted it." Ugh. Nails on a chalkboard!

* A LOT of talk about sex and boobs. I'm by no means a prude, but this felt like it was written by a teenage boy who watches A LOT of bad porn. Judge for yourself...

-- "I love how her breasts jiggle," he said. "I'm really crazy about her."
"They jiggle?" I asked.
"Yes. Like flying saucers. She uses Ivory Soap on her gazungas."
"So, Susan soaping her breasts is your sex fantasy?"
"Yes, and once I watched her shave her legs. What a thrill I got."

-- The next girl didn't have a good body, but her breasts were fantastic. She made a show of unhooking her bra and maneuvering it so that she was able to get it out of her sleeves. The spray of the water revealed breasts that were shaped like watermelons and nipples that were extremely large.
"Man, look at those things," said Big Ty. "Are they not ripe or what?" 
    The cute Asian girl on the bar didn't have much to show off. She was extremely flat-chested, but the cold water had stiffened her nipples. It was erotic and I couldn't stop myself from staring.
"Damn, those things could cut glass," said Big Ty.

-- "You make my ramrod stand at attention," Chester blurted.
"Sometimes I like to watch porn," Susan said to Chester.
"Do you like whips and chains?" asked Chester.
Susan twirled some of her long black hair around her fingers. "No. The only time I'm violent is when I'm playing Dungeons and Dragons. Do you play?"
Chester wrapped his hands around her black lace gloves. "I'd play with you. I want to kiss you."
"We just met."
"Then when? Please don't give me blue balls."
Susan smiled. "Postponement heightens gratification."

-- Karl was in front of the window. Before I could say hello, I realized he was having sex. His jeans and boxers were wrapped around his ankles. He grunted as he rocked back and forth and did the girl from behind.
    The girl was bent over his desk with her jean skirt hiked up over her ass. She had great legs. She was still wearing brown knee-high boots, but her white polo shirt, bra and panties lay nearby on the floor. Karl knew how to make good use of an afternoon.
    I stared, my mouth open. The angle at which the desk was positioned allowed me to watch Karl as his hands wrapped around the girl's large, firm breasts; his thumbs were on top of her nipples. His back muscles tightened every time he thrust forward. She moaned with pleasure. I began to back out of the room quietly.
    "Oh God, fuck me. Yes! Yes! Don't stop. Fuck me harder," the girl demanded loudly.

-- She sat up and pulled a pink heart-shaped box off the shelf above her bed and tore open a green foil package that had a mint-flavored condom inside.
    She gently placed the condom on me and held it there before using her mouth to roll it down. Damn, did I get hard. She really knew what she was doing. My expectations had been way too low.
"I'm almost afraid to ask," I said. "Where did you learn how to do that?" 
    She giggled. "I read an article in Cosmo on 10 ways to spice things up in the bedroom. That was No. 2."
"I'd love to see what No. 1 was," I said teasingly.

-- I lost myself in the moment. I fumbled with my belt while she pulled down her panties and lifted her skirt. I entered her. She said she had two orgasms. I felt like a total stud.
 

I could go on forever, but I think you get the idea. It seems like the author spent a week viewing teen movies and porn and then decided to write a book. This is decidedly the WORST book I've ever read! Good grief, I think I'm scarred for life. I'm going to have to go on a strict diet of Shakespeare and Steinbeck to try and undo the damage caused by this book. *shudder*

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See

Random House, 2005
253 pages
Read - August 16, 2011
2 Stars

19th-century China, foot binding, secret languages (nu shu), sworn sisters (laotong), arranged marriages, death, betrayal...all compelling subjects. Sadly, the way Lisa See handled these subjects in Snow Flower and the Secret Fan was not that great. My biggest grievance is that the story is told from the perspective of 80-something-year-old Lily looking back on her life with Snow Flower (her laotong) and SHE FREAKING SPOILS EVERY BIT OF THE STORY FOR YOU EVERY STEP OF THE WAY! She'll be telling you a story about someone when they were young, pause to tell you that they die in some tragic way in a few years, then continues on with the original story about that person. It is not 'foreshadowing,' it is flat out SPOILING. There was no mystery of how the story would unfold because freakin' Lily kept telling me who would get married, who would die, who would be betrayed...yada yada yada. Jerk.

I'm actually kind of surprised that I finished this book, considering how little I cared about any of the characters. Honestly, I only picked up this book because the movie was coming out and I'm, of course, the kind of person who typically likes to read the book first. Really wish I had just watched the movie and skipped the book though. I don't know if the movie is any better, but I have a hard time believing it could be as blah as the book.

Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk
Owl Books/Henry Holt, 1996
208 pages
Read - August 29, 2011
3 Stars

The first rule of fight club is you don't talk about fight club. The second rule of fight club is you DO NOT talk about fight club. So, my hands are tied. There can really be no review of Fight Club. And you've all seen the movie anyway. The book doesn't have a shirtless Brad Pitt and is, therefore, not as great. I am Joe's Major Disappointment.

As Better Book Titles would say, "IT'S ALL FUN AND GAMES UNTIL SOMEONE STARTS A SECRET ARMY TO DESTROY CIVILIZATION" (or "I Like Beating the Crap Out of People Better Than Shopping For a Duvet").

Some people just ruin the fun for everyone.

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SUMMER 2011 TOTAL:
12 books

3,700 pages

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I'm already curled up with some great fall reads and feeling fine...