26/100

Twilight by Stephenie Meyer

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
I requested the entire Twilight series from the library thinking that it would take forever to come in. The hubbub over this book is amazing. I think it is safe to say that it is the new Harry Potter. Keeping in mind that I never like Harry Potter, I stupidly thought I would love this series as much as the next person.

I read the first couple chapters and kept thinking, pretty soon I am going to get drawn in and not be able to put the book down. It never happened. The book was okay. Just okay.

It is the story of Bella Swan, a girl who needs to get away from her life in Arizona since her mom has remarried and she feels like she needs a change. She goes to Forks, Washington to live with her dad, Charlie. While there, all of the high school boys fall in love with her. Chaos ensues. She is smitten with the unattainable Edward Cullen, a boy that is constantly described as beautiful. Long story short, Edward loves her too but he needs to keep his distance because...wait for it...he's a vampire. Yup, a vampire.

Over 500 pages, Bella loves Edward, Edward loves her back and Bella meets the rest of his vampire family. None of Edward or his family eat people because they are "good." But there are bad vampires and a couple of them decided they want to eat Bella. Naturally, Edward comes to the rescue and everything is hunky dorey.

I didn't really understand why Bella freaks out over blood or why she is clumsy, and accident prone, and hates dancing. I felt like Stephanie Meyer was hinting that she had some sort of weird disease or something but nothing ever materialized. I found Bella kind of annoying and it also bothered me how Edward never listens to her and instead decides that he knows what is best for her, regardless of what she wants.

I know that I am the minority in not liking this, but it just was not for me. I am hesitant to read the rest of the series, but since I already have it I am going to give it a try.


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25/100

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
I have tried reading JSF before and I couldn't even get passed the first couple of pages. But I was drawn to this book because of its September 11th storyline. Since I wasn't a fan of JSF's previous work I decided to try an audiobook. This is my first audiobook that was not Phillipa Gregory.



Oscar Schell was living a contented life as an 8-year old with a father he loved unconditionally. Sadly, his father was at a meeting in the World Trade Center the day of September 11th and he perished in the building. Oscar is desperate to have a lasting link to his father and his wish is granted when he finds a key in his father's closet. The key is in an envelope marked "Black." Oscar tracks down every "Black" in the NYC phone book and meets with all of them in order to find the lock that fits the key.



While we learn about Oscar's story, we concurrently learn the history of his grandparents' relationship.



I was going to give this book a four, but the grandmother's voice and story really annoyed me at times. Such are the drawbacks of an audiobook. I was also really annoyed with the whole description of how the grandfather refused to speak. He gets words tattooed on him and writes everything else. I felt like it got really old after a while.



This was a really heartwrenching book at times. The sadness you feel for Oscar is really palpable. And since Oscar rarely gets along with his mother or grandmother, you don't really feel the happier times very often.


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24/100

The Girls by Lori Lansens

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
When I started reading the first page of this book, I realized that I was reading ANOTHER book about conjoined twins. This is right after reading Geek Love, mind you, so I was skeptical. But this book was very different. It was the story of "The girls" a pair (obviously) of conjoined twins born in a small town. At the beginning of the book, the girls are the oldest living cranial conjoined twins - about to hit their 30th birthday. The story is mainly told by Rose, but at times Ruby steps in to tell her side. I really liked this book at first, but after a while it just seemed long winded. I felt like it could have been at least 40 pages shorter and eventually I was just looking for it to end. It wasn't a bad book, though, and I was glad to read something a little different.


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23/100

I Was Told There'd Be Cake by Sloane Crosley

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
Dear Melissa,

Stop reading short stories. You don't like them. You never will like them. Regardless of how catchy the title may be, you are still going to hate the book. Stop wasting your time.


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22/100

Smart Vs. Pretty by Valerie Frankel

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
I chose this book because I was interested in one of Frankel's other books and I wanted to check her out. I thought this book was pretty pointless. It was like an unfunny early Janet Evanovich novel. The title didn't really make sense since the whole smart vs. pretty thing was rarely touched on and I didn't connect with any of the characters. I didn't really care what happened to them, and that is rare for me. I am very skeptical about trying the other book now.


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21/100

Geek Love: A Novel by Katherine Dunn

My review

rating: 1 of 5 stars
Let me start by saying I had no idea what I was getting into when I picked this book up. I was under the impression that geek was synonymous with nerd. I thought it would be some light, entertaining reading after some books I didn't particularly like. Boy, was I wrong. I was quite surprised when the first page started talking about biting chickens heads off.



The book is more or less about a circus family who look down upon "norms." The weirder you are, the higher your stature. The mother takes various drugs to try and make the most screwed up children she can. Now I know some people could be disturbed by this. I was okay with the concept, but a boy with flippers, conjoined twins and a hunchback just weren't that entertaining to me. I could not get into the book AT ALL. I know people who love it draw parallels to the world and how normalcy is overrated but I just thought it was annoying drivel. I skimmed through a lot of it just to finish the book.


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20/100

The Day I Ate Whatever I Wanted: And Other Small Acts of Liberation by Elizabeth Berg

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
The title of this book got me hook, line, and sinker. It sounds like my ideal day. And while I did enjoy that particular story, and the other ones about weight, I could not get into any of the others. I just kept thinking, what is the point of this story? Safe to say, I was not a fan at all.


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19/100

The Boleyn Inheritance by Philippa Gregory

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I love this series. As mentioned before, I just listened to The Constant Princess on audiobook so I decided to order The Boleyn Inheritance and listen to it was well.

The story is told from the perspective of 3 people: Anne of Cleves (who becomes King Henry's 4th wife), Jane Boleyn (who was married to George Boleyn and was Anne Boleyn's sister-in-law), and Katherine Howard (who becomes Henry's 5th wife).

It is easy to love Anne because she seems like a down-to-Earth person who has just been down on her luck for her entire life. You just really feel sorry for her. Although in the audio book, I hated how the speaker would spit out "ANNE!" whenever it was her time to tell her story.

I didn't like Jane Boleyn at all. From TOBG it seemed like she was against George and Anne and now all of a sudden she misses them so much and is so sad about their deaths. It sort of becomes clearer towards the end, but I still thought that was a little weird.

I thought Katherine Howard was annoying at first, but then I grew to like her. She was funny at times, and you just feel for her for being so very young.

The end of the book was heart wrenching, especially since I was hearing it all play out. I can't wait to read the next book in the series.


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18/100

Please Stop Laughing at Me: One Woman's Inspirational Story by Jodee Blanco

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
Let me start by saying that I am a special education teacher and my brother was constantly teased because of a physical disability. With that being said, I thought this book was just annoying.



The story is about a girl who moves through school after school after school and continues to be tormented by her classmates for various reason. And by tormented, I mean physically assaulted on a daily basis. The kids were downright evil, the teachers were nasty, and her parents seemed like morons.



I honestly have a hard time believing the responses that she got. She wrote the part of a martyr, basically constantly sticking up for the little guy, while she was tormented for no reason by heinous people. Teachers laughed at her and sided with tormentors. Her parents sent HER to a shrink.



I felt like the whole time, she wanted people to tell her how wonderful she was. There was constant foreshadowing of, "But they never knew just how wrong they were" or "who knew it would almost cost me my life" and stuff like that. And her mom called her "Angel" probably half a million times. Obviously, I was not a fan.


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17/100

Love the One You're With by Emily Giffin

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I have always like Emily Giffin and maybe that is why this book is getting 4 stars instead of 3. The story is about a newlywed woman who runs into the love of her life who she broke up with 8 years prior. From there we see her struggle with what could have been and what she currently has with her husband and new life. I think it was almost disconcerting because it was so easy to relate to. It made it uncomfortable to think of being in her situation. This was a good, quick read and I look forward to more Giffin in the future.


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