Mr. Lincoln's Army by Bruce Catton



I am, admittedly, a Civil War nerd. But I also have little patience for the lists of regiments and commanders with confusing battle maps that I can never understand. Thank you Bruce Catton for educating me without frustrating me...

Most of the interesting Civil War books that I have read - most of them reasonably accurate historical fiction - have been focussed more on the Southern generals. Much of this is because the Southern Cause was just generally more romantic with more personality from their gentlemen generals, and living in Virginia tends to put a definitively Lee/Jackson focus on history. Considering my previous knowledge, reading a book about the Army of the Potomac was pretty eye-opening.

In school I always had the impression that McClellan was a bit of a bumbling idiot, and I assumed he was more of a political appointment than anything else. I had no idea that he was a beloved figure for the troops, and had no sense of any romance and glory associated with him. I also had never heard just how close to winning the Union came early on in the war - it's a little distressing to read some of the obvious mistakes made by the Federal generals. Hindsight is surely 20/20, but it's upsetting to recognize how a decisive victory could have caused the entire war to crumble.

Generally the book was more about the people than the troop movements, and I appreciate Catton's heavy use of journals and regimental histories. The analysis of Antietam got a little too detail-oriented for me, but I recognize that many people want the history of a battle like that. Catton didn't fail to make the battle a human one however, and the first-hand descriptions of Bloody Lane and the battlefield were chilling.

Many of the bibliographical notes were informative and interesting. I definitely want to learn more about the Federal intelligence department that so grossly misinformed McClellan despite their modern infiltration tactics. I also love hearing about Lincoln, and am always thrilled when Sandburg's books are mentioned.

If you're looking to learn about the Civil War, I'm not sure that you can get more enjoyable than Catton's writing. It's informative without being overly dry, and covers the broader scope - examining not just tactics, but also the political atmosphere and the personal impact of the events.

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How Starbucks Saved My Life: A Son of Privilege Learns to Live Like Everyone Else by Michael Gates Gill


My rating: 2 of 5 stars
What an exceptionally cheesy "inspirational" book...

Grabbed this one from a bargain bin and planned to send it to my step-mom, but I'm not sure I'll even get that far.

The author has an interesting experience, and seems to want to learn from it. Had he not been so obnoxious, this book might have been tolerable and worth recommended - to people who appreciate cheesy inspirational books anyway.

Unfortunately the author is not kidding when he says he is 'a son of privilege'... he's a rich brat with a well-known literati father. Had he not insisted on constantly name-dropping in every 'flashback' recollection of his childhood, I might not have gotten fed-up. But the constant emphasis on what he HAD been makes it pretty clear that he still values that life more than anything he may have learned from his new 'partners' at Starbucks.

Mostly the book seems to be a rich white guy relishing his experiment at slumming, and while he describes himself as changing, I don't see much evidence of it. Sadly, particularly because the author was originally an ad-exec at a hotshot firm, the entire book reads like an employment ad for Starbucks. Even his praise for his peers is condescending, and when he reflects on being fired from his high profile ad agency by a woman he'd trained, he's downright offensive.

I think this book mostly got play off of the Starbucks name, and probably some industry connections the author had from his previous life. When compared to a life story like The Pursuit of Happyness, this one is just pathetic, it's not inspiring, it's self-aggrandizing and embarrassing.

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The Two: The Story of the Original Siamese Twins by Irving Wallace


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
One of my last AABB book swap finds, I took forever to decide to read it because it has a musty, falling-apart book jacket that I thought I would lose if I carried it around much. I was right, but it's not in terrible condition...

I've always been kind of fascinated by conjoined twins, so reading about the original Siamese Twins was pretty interesting. The story encompasses a lot of topics actually - not just conjoined twins but also Siam/Thailand in the 19th century, the vaudeville circuit, and a bit about the Civil War.

I found the book to be a little slow at times, particularly in its coverage of the melodrama of the Twins early management and the later melodrama of the marital situation, but it was all worth reading. The minutia of life as a conjoined twin was covered a bit less than I expected, mostly because the Twins lived in a time when tell-all stories weren't really as... graphic as they would be now. Still, it seemed that the brothers were quite willing to share their lives with the audience - at least when they were younger - and their openness is pretty impressive when you consider the attitudes many people have about "freaks". I found their later life to be amazing - though it made for somewhat boring reading - simply because of the acceptance of their unusual family in a small Southern community.

The book wasn't can't-put-it-down engrossing, but it got a 4th star for being about an unusual subject and covering so much detail. Kind of a weird read, but unique enough to be entirely worth the experience.

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The Light Fantastic by Terry Pratchett


My rating: 3 of 5 stars
For whatever reason, this book didn't annoy me as much as the previous one. However, after reading these two, I don't think I feel compelled to commit to reading all of the Discworld books.

Pratchett's humor is entertaining, and this one seemed a little less self-consciously clever than the first one. But so much of it seems to be throwaway humor, I just can't imagine reading a series based around it.

I was actually a little sad to see the tourist go, but at least the luggage will stick around. Unfortunately I just found Rincewind annoying, and the idea of him being in charge of anything just seems frustrating.

Oh well, I finished these books before Thanksgiving, which was my goal. So, after probably 4 years of being 'borrowed' I can finally return them to their rightful owner.

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Louder Than Words: A Mother's Journey in Healing Autism by Jenny McCarthy


My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Not wanting to get into any of the autism/vaccine controversy, I can't speak to the validity of McCarthy's theories on the subject. And while I haven't seen her interviews, at least in this book McCarthy does not pretend to be an expert - just a mom who is trying to share her experiences. I never felt that she was preachy or stating her ideas as facts, just her own experience with her own son's illness.It was still an interesting book though. I think in general the medical establishment does tend to frown upon ideas outside of their knowledge. The idea of alternative treatments makes sense for a condition that has so much variety. I respect McCarthy's efforts to wade through all the BS thrown at her by distant doctors and the red tape required to get aid. If she has been able to help her son, and if this information has helped others... GOOD.The book was short and gave some sense of a mother's reality while trying to treat, diagnose, and love a child with health problems. And if what McCarthy says is true, then her 'start here' guide for autism that she includes in the back of the book is sorely needed.Quick read, and one that I'm sure can help other families trying to cope with this condition.

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Street Gang: The Complete History of Sesame Street by Michael Davis


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I am rather pleased that I managed to finish this book on Sesame Street's 40th birthday...

This is a tough one to review... Muppets and Sesame Street seem to be all mixed up with my ability to think logically. They're the characters and the illusions I grew up with, and facing their reality is really tough. I had similar issues when faced with the real thing at a Muppet exhibit at the Smithsonian, or when I read the coffee table book I bought there. Much as I love these characters, I have a very difficult time linking them with the problems of real life. It's particularly strange because I only vaguely grew up with the sense of Muppets... maybe because I moved a lot, or because we weren't really encouraged to watch much TV, but I actually remember them more as cultural touchstones than as parts of my growing up.

The book was interesting, and delves way back into the lives of the creators and the history of children's television. I had no idea - though of course it makes sense - that so much of the talent for Sesame Street came from Captain Kangaroo! Frankly it's still kind of hard for me to believe that Sesame Street is old enough to be the Captain's contemporary... But the author traces the six degrees (or less) of separation that brought all of the men and women together to fight for Sesame Street and its beginnings.

Much like when I read the book about Nancy Drew, I was blown away by the many connections all these people had in common... How did it never occur to me that these same people created Electric Company and Square One?! It's always shocking how small the world is in hind sight when you can pull all the connections together.

And can I judge it a flaw that this book "rushed" through the good years of Sesame Street to linger on the deaths of its creators? I suppose if someone wants to reminisce about the good times it's best done on film... the Muppets don't exactly work when described in words. But for a book about one of the happier places on Earth, it seemed to relish the dark side of its subject. There were only a handful of short chapters about the years I REALLY cared about - the ones I watched! - and then a few more about the rapid decline of the Street's ratings and its rather horrifying sellout that I apparently missed entirely!

So much time is spent tracing the people behind Sesame Street, and I suppose I expected more fun and less business. But I enjoyed learning some of what I learned, I just could have done without some of the more boring business meeting/audit stuff. And I would have happily done without some of the last couple of chapters all about death.

The book was very much a history of Sesame Street, and maybe that isn't what I wanted. I expected more memories and fond stories about the good times, because in a land of Muppets, clearly there were a lot of good times. It was a good read, and an interesting one, but not exactly what I expected. It earns an extra star because it is about Muppets, and because I can't hold it against the author that sometimes people die and companies move on to try to compete with Barney by commercializing an extremely annoying red character with a falsetto.

If nothing else, this makes me want to buy Sesame Street: The Complete Series one day...

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Splendor by Anna Godbersen


My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I'm glad this series is over. I was sucked in by a pretty cover, and proceeded to buy all 4 books despite the fact that they're kind of terrible. That being said, I enjoy them, and they're quick trashy YA reads with slightly more complicated characters than the usual. This was a reasonably good ending, somewhat happy and tragic at the same time. Diana held on to her independence in a satisfying way, the two cads of the series got what they deserved, and suddenly Will's death made a lot more sense.That being said, the beginning of the book was rather slow with a sudden race towards the end. It read like perhaps the author was hit with a second wind and an exciting new plot halfway through the story.Oh well, it was an enjoyable read, and a satisfying end to the series. No more pretty dresses for me to purchase and put on my bookshelf.

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Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster by Jon Krakauer


My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Adventure books aren't usually my thing, so this book didn't do a whole lot for me. But generally I enjoy Krakauer's writing, and I had read enough about the controversy of this book to consider it worth a read.

It was certainly one of the fastest 400 page books I've ever read. Krakauer keeps the suspense going without making it over the top and unbelievable. The quotes at the beginning of each chapter are also very good - interesting, relevant, and slightly foreshadowing.

I had read the Outside article online, as well as various rebuttals by Krakauer's critics, so most of the events were not a surprise. But I found the analysis in the book much more interesting - due to the slightly longer time to reflect, and the ability to go more in depth with this book.

Most disturbing, I thought, was the author's realization that his very existence on the trip may have caused some of the events that occurred. The pressure on the guides due to Krakauer's article, and another climber's social status, may have been the reason some of the decisions were made. I think Krakauer does ultimately take too much blame onto himself, but I respect that he points out his own culpability in the deaths of his teammates.

As a fairly experienced amateur climber himself, I think the author lends an interesting perspective to the narrative. He recognizes how different climbing Everest is from any other experience, and he is also surprised by the 'every man for himself' mentality of the "teams" trying to reach the summit. As he points out, climbing is usually very team-based, climbers must trust their team to make life or death decisions. The guided trips described in the book seem to discourage that aspect of climbing, and that mentality alone may have caused some of the problems. Someone who had not climbed before might not recognize these subtleties that make Krakauer's assessment of the disaster rather unique.

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Dubliners by James Joyce


My rating: 1 of 5 stars
I hate James Joyce. I read Portrait of an Artist during my senior English class in high school, and hated it. I was willing to give him a second chance. He is a well-respected author, and I hate stream of consciousness by just about anyone. I'd heard Dubliners was better, and it's short enough to be worth a quick read.

While it's BETTER than Portrait of an Artist, I still thought it was terrible. Maybe Joyce is writing on some whole other level that I'm not clever enough to follow, but I thought these stories were boring.

Glad I read it, I now feel more confident in saying I hate James Joyce's writing. Glad I got that out of the way.

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The Skies of Pern by Anne McCaffrey


My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Trashy scifi that kept me briefly entertained...

McCaffrey's books aren't usually particularly compelling, but they're usually enjoyable quick reads. Skies of Pern is no exception, although the more recent books have struggled to find strong characters worth an entire book.

I've gotten a little tired of the push towards technology in the later Pern books, and this book continues the trend. I find the tech vs tradition stuff a little boring and cliched, and this book pretty explicitly addresses these societal issues in Pern. Unfortunately, I don't really give a crap about Pern society, I want to read about dragons and life in a Weyr.

Many of the sort of "classic" Pern main characters are dead, aging, or effectively absent in this book, and the two main characters are rather boring - even in their romance. The big reveal of new dragon abilities isn't very exciting, and the idea of Pern without fighting Thread is pretty boring as well. I guess McCaffrey is getting us ready for that eventuality in this book with its lack of Weyr-life and Thread-fighting.

My enjoyment of the Pern novels has gone down with the later books, and this one is a classic case of that. Still, it was an enjoyable trashy read, and I'm sure I'll still read the next one.

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The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game by Michael Lewis


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Considering how football-ignorant I am, I really enjoyed this book. I enjoy watching football during the season, but have never learned much about how the game works. Most of the positions beyond QB and kicker are baffling to me, so following plays is impossible. Fortunately, The Blind Side manages to add a human element to keep the game interesting. I certainly am still confused, but the book did enlighten me about certain aspects of the game that I was unaware of.

Lewis does a great job of providing enough background to understand his points without swamping a reader with too much information. This book isn't just about Michael Oher; it's about the changes in football offensive strategy over the course of a few decades. Oher is just a convenient - and crowd-pleasing - example of the way football and the NFL has evolved.

Oher's story is pretty amazing, to the point of being a little unbelievable. But if you go with the flow, and accept that his adoptive family are the saints they seem to be, the book is pretty touching.

Glad I read it, I learned something, and I think I'll see the movie. Over-all, pretty enjoyable read.

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Derby Girl by Shauna Cross


My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Full disclosure: I'm a derby girl who saw Whip It twice before it was officially released. I'm also a devout fan of Drew Barrymore, and Ellen Page. This book had to really hustle to come anywhere near a movie that I really enjoyed and believed.

Since I just recently saw the movie, of course, I'm left comparing the book. In a rare occurrence, I actually preferred the movie. Unfortunately, this means my review is a lot more about how well the movie managed things that the book didn't.

Ultimately, the book is a reasonably motivating chick lit title about a sport I love. If nothing else, a book that exposes young women to roller derby, and presents it as a sport - a fast-paced, punk rock, crowd-exciting, chick-empowering, all-embracing SPORT - can't be too bad. It's certainly a unique subject matter.

Take the roller derby out and it's a fairly generic teen romance. Girl is an outcast and struggles both at school and at home with her indie rock sensibilities. Soulmate/kindred spirit best friend vs. hottie rocker boyfriend ends in tears and eventual kiss and makeups. Mom and Dad come to terms with their little girl growing up. All pretty universal themes.

And the movie takes these themes, expands on them, and takes the mis-steps of the book and brings Bliss to an even more satisfactory end. In the book, Bliss spends a lot of time complaining about her situation or moping or being snarky. Of course, any inner monologue will have a bit much teenage angst and introspection, and the book takes that self-pity to a level that Ellen Page never hits in the movie. Where the movie shows sparkling well-rounded characters, the book relies on derby names to create a character who we never really see. Book Bliss spends most of her time reacting to the situations she's left in rather than initiating some action, and I'm not nearly as satisfied with the book's pat happy ending.

I just wasn't thrilled with Derby Girl (and I didn't think the movie was exactly brilliant either), mostly because it seemed that the characters were more annoying and less human than they were portrayed in the movie. I expected a more endearing mom, a less snarky more sweet and self-aware Bliss, and roller girls that existed outside of their derby personas. I think I'd rather my (theoretical) daughter watch the movie, since it flaunts the girl-power theme in a much more accessible way while still addressing the issues that the book goes after.

If you're reading the book because you're interested in derby, go see a bout in person. If you're reading the book because you saw Whip It, you'll be disappointed. If you're reading the book because you're looking for a generic YA book with an eye-catching cover, fair enough, but don't expect to find anything particularly thrilling inside. And if you read the book and can't imagine why they made it into a movie, give Whip It a chance. It breathes life into these characters in a beautiful way that makes these relationships - all of them - much more believable and honest than Cross displays them here.

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Inside Inside by James Lipton


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Favorite James Lipton facts:
- He's married to Miss Scarlet.
- He was a pimp in France.
- He was a nationally competitive equestrian.

This is a pretty difficult book to review... The first third of the book is largely about Lipton's pre-Bravo career. I suppose if I knew more about earlier eras of film and the entertainment industry this could have been fascinating. But I find Method acting to be irritating - successful or not, its practitioners are always annoying as hell. The occasional snippet from the show would slip in, or an account of time spent with Bob Hope, or some interesting trivia would catch my interest. I was mostly bored.

And then... suddenly the Drama School is created, along with the TV show. The creation of the School and show is actually pretty interesting. What a shockingly unique idea! The rest of the book is largely recounts of various moments from the show. With over 200 episodes, it covers some highlights, many of which weren't aired on TV. Humor, tragedy, and interesting patterns emerge from the talents that appear on stage. I had no idea such a wide array of people had done the show. My one season of viewing (even though I watched a LOT of Bravo that year) barely scratched the surface.

Mostly this book made me want to watch the show. Without cable, one of the few networks I miss is Bravo, and this show is one of the biggest reasons. I spent a large chunk of my last year of college parked in front of the TV crocheting and watching Inside the Actors Studio and 2 episodes of the West Wing every day. Sadly, there aren't seasons of the show out on DVD. It's a shame, this would probably be one of very few shows that I would be willing to invest a couple hundred dollars in.

Until I got to the second half of the book I was pretty bored and annoyed. Lipton is as pompous as he is often portrayed, though by the end of the book I'm more willing to tolerate it. Before I read this I had little understanding of WHY James Lipton could sit on stage and hound these talents. I now have a better sense of who Lipton is, his range of skills, passions, and successes make it a lot more reasonable and his cockiness more well-deserved. By the end, I'm left really liking Lipton, and really missing the show.

Highly recommended to any fan of Inside the Actors Studio, though I'm not sure there's much of a point if you haven't seen the show. The book is a good repository of industry talk (not just gossip), but I suspect most people who are interested in these discussions of craft are probably already fans of the show anyway.


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The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Am I just a sucker for DC trivia, or did Dan Brown finally learn how to end a book?

It might actually be both...

I didn't expect to read another Robert Langdon book, and I certainly didn't expect to "need" to buy it while still in hardcover. But when I read an excerpt and found that it started out just blocks away from my old apartment at the Scottish Rite temple on 16th Street... There was really no way I couldn't read the book. Immediately.

Dan Brown's books are always excellent suspense, and I will unashamedly admit to staying up all night to finish this one. Even knowing how much I despise Brown's endings, I still had to power through to make it to this one. It wasn't anything spectacular, but the last few chapters didn't make me actually cringe and try to block them out. So that's something.

Mostly I was just thrilled to follow the characters through streets and buildings that I was familiar with. No matter how far-fetched the action got, I was usually pretty familiar with the distances they traveled, the landmarks they passed, and often right with them as they bounced from one clue to the next.

I'm not sure this book had quite the compelling conspiracy that the DaVinci Code had, but I did enjoy the style and writing more. As a history nerd and former DC resident this book had immediate appeal that I'm not sure would be universal. Still, it was decent suspense, with some fun DC trivia. I enjoyed it and thought it was better than his previous Langdon novels.

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Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All: A Novel by Allan Gurganus


My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I'd tried to read this book several times. It is one of the slowest paced but still decent books I've ever read. I'm glad I finally finished, but I can't say I would recommend it to... well, anyone I can think of.

I'm a Civil War buff and I'm always intrigued by the female perspective. The title character (Lucy) is a pretty interesting premise to start with... a young boy went off to war, grew up and got old, and married a young girl. Lucy ends up married to a Confederate veteran and living with him through his own senility. It's an interesting perspective - a family and marriage impacted by the shadows of a war that had ended long before the family ever came to be. Lucy pays the price (and reaps the rewards) of her husband's memories, her mother-in-law's tragic meeting with Sherman's forces, and a former slave's attachment to the family.

The book covers such a long length of time... we follow Lucy from childhood to near senility, but stop to flashback to her husband's childhood and war stories, and even her mother-in-law's childhood AND a slave's journey from Africa. It's generations packed into one book, and it all gets to be a little much. It is dense and long and a real effort to plow through. Not because the writing is bad, but because it isn't sparkling and sunshine. The stories read like truth and not too-pretty fiction.

Despite my struggles to finish the book, Gurganus chooses the right tone, I think. A quicker pace, flashier writing, or snappier dialog wouldn't fit with Lucy's almost too-realistic walk through her life. Her story is all about making it through all that life throws at you, and it is often the small things that become her stumbling blocks. Her life is dreary and full of drudgery, but there is plenty of humor to keep her - and the reader - going.

The ending of the book absolutely shocked me, and I was really surprised that I could be surprised by a book that dragged along so slowly. I can't imagine a better ending, since it makes you look at Lucy and her long life story in quite a different light. I can't say the ending made the rest of the long slow effort worth it, but it certainly let me finish the book without feeling cheated.

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Bare: The Naked Truth About Stripping by Elisabeth Eaves


My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Pretty bland memoir of time spent primarily in a peep show.

I expected this to be a broader spectrum of stripping. Instead it's a somewhat confusing account of the author's time spent working at a peep show in the Northwest. I don't think the well-educated feministas depicted in this book are really a very good representation of most workers in the sex-industry (sadly).

The author has a difficult time separating her own life from the life of a stripper. I wanted less gossip and more analysis or a wider range of contributors. She does briefly follow a friend's career as a party dancer, but it's not very revealing. (haha)

There are better written and more entertaining books about stripping out there. I'd put this one at the bottom of the list. If you're looking for something more academic or analytical, there are plenty of those as well.

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Leave Me Alone, I'm Reading: Finding and Losing Myself in Books by Maureen Corrigan


My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I didn't enjoy this as much as the other book I'd read about reading (that I can't find for the life of me).

As someone who wasn't very familiar with the genres discussed in this book, I didn't get a ton out of it. This was a book that was decent, but I didn't enjoy through no real fault of the book itself. It was a book more about the author than books sometimes, and our life stories have very little in common. The genres she discusses - detective fiction and Catholic morality tales aren't really things I know much about.

Any book about reading is going to appeal to me to a certain extent, and really, the title alone is enough to make me smile. Clearly the author and I are kindred spirits on some level.

Despite not being thrilled with this, I hate to rate it lower than 3 stars. It was well-written and enjoyable, just didn't quite click with me.

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The Face Behind The Veil by Donna Gehrke-White


My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Definitely an interesting book, but not a particularly well-written one. A series of short biographies of American women and their relationship to Islam. Some women are American converts, others are immigrants, others are women who have left Islam for various reasons.

Each woman has a valuable and unique story that I enjoyed reading. Some women's stories are linked - mothers and daughters, friends, or members of the same community. Every perspective opens up another window to Islam in America, most of which I had never considered.

I found the women who are melding their previous culture to a new religion to be the most interesting. Latinas from a Catholic tradition, or a Japanese-American from the South are not women I would have considered as Muslims, nor is it a transition I expect was easy.

With such interesting women, it seems that the author struggled to get everything in. Each woman's story is so short that they start to sound a little repetitive. It's like a Who's Who of Muslim women and the book suffers for it. Rather than pulling the stories together and reflecting on the power of these experiences, the author takes the easy way out by piling short essays one after another. The reader is left to do the comparison, but without the breadth of knowledge of these women that the author has.

The book shares unique perspectives, but there are other books about women in Islam that I've found much more interesting. This is the first book I've read about American women, but it was not so compelling that I'd recommend it over other better books that reflect similar circumstances. Without a decent knowledge of some of these issues (veiling, women's rights) in other contexts and countries, I'm not sure this book would have had much value.

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So very VERY VERY sad that I missed these authors at the Baltimore Book Festival...

Also forgot to mention how much I liked the portrayal of gays in this one. They are flamboyant and silly (and a little over-sexed), but they are good friends and sweet. For that matter, just the fact that they exist at all is nice in a YA book not explicitly about homosexuality. The gay characters are positive characters, and are integrated into the story without any sort of heavy-handedness.

Did I mention I love this book?!

Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist by Rachel Cohn


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Can I gush enough about this book?!?!? It hit me the way that The Perks of Being a Wallflower hit me. I wouldn't say that it's a 'normal' teenage experience, but it FEELS like one. Everything is intense and shiny and IMPORTANT. For lack of a better comparison, I would say this is a bit like a younger High Fidelity.

Starting off with a rough and tumble description of a punk show, I just totally fell in love. This is the night I always wanted, and the characters are over-the-top but in a pretty honest way. The two authors switch back and forth between Nick and Norah giving each character a unique voice. The switches overlap just enough to keep from being disjointed or repetitive.

I can't even process what struck me so hard... It's a compelling combination of music I love, teenage intensity that I envy, awkward conversations that develop into real ones, and the feeling of falling in and out of love all at once.

I think this is absolutely BRILLIANT YA literature, but I suspect it has some issues due to the language and sex in the book. This is a book that probably gets a bad rap despite being a fairly realistic idea of what a high school senior and an older boy are probably doing and saying. None of the cursing or sex felt gratuitous to me, though some could have probably been left out without affecting the authenticity. But I think if more books read like this one, more kids would be reading.

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Bought: A Novel by Anna David


My rating: 1 of 5 stars
Really unclear about why my step-mom sent this in a recent box from Burma. Did she like this book? Did she think I would? That's kind of embarrassing...

This was a totally trashy book that I read on a rainy day without much stopping. I thought it was pretty terrible, but I can only say so much when I read it so quickly.

Bought follows an annoying journalist of the stars through her attempt to come up with a feature article. Suddenly she becomes friends with a manipulative call girl and has to lie her way through a variety of situations in pursuit of an article about Hollywood prostitution. All sorts of hijinks ensue, but, don't worry, it's all wrapped up in the end.

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