Angieville

I fell in love with the title of Lian Dolan 's sophomore novel the moment I read it in the email pitch. Then I read on to find out there was Shakespeare. It was a done deal at that point. Honestly, all you have to do is dangle a little Shakespeare in front of me and I am on board. This was my first encounter with Ms. Dolan's work. I had never heard of either of her novels before, and I have to say that ratcheted up my anticipation a bit. It's summer. And I am in the mood to be entertained. By all means, bring on the new-to-me contemporary fiction with a side of Shakespeare and a touch of romance on the side! As far as covers go, I really like these sort of retro chick lit covers both Elizabeth the First Wife and Helen of Pasadena have going on. The're attractive and light, perfect to slip in your bag and pull out as needed on a sunny summer afternoon. Elizabeth Lancaster has made her peace with her past. What's done is done. She divorced her movie star husband...

I received a pitch for this book a few months back and dithered around on it a bit before deciding to give it a shot. But I had to wait, of course, for the right moment. And that moment came the other night after putting everyone to bed and coming off a rather unsatisfying read the night before. It helped that I haven't really read any true chick lit for awhile. What didn't help was the cover and the title. Nope. Not representative of the book at all, as far as I'm concerned. So if you're put off by either, don't leave yet. Because I settled in with Grace Grows and did not surface again until I had finished it. The thing is it made me laugh right off the bat. In fact, I'd read a passage aloud to my husband before I was three chapters in--a sure sign I'm enjoying a book immensely. If he has to hear a bit of it aloud as I am reading it , then he knows I'm in it for the long haul. Turns out Grace Grows is so readable and engrossing that the "long h...

I've never read any Sophie Kinsella before. It's true. I'm not sure if it was the titles of her Shopaholic series that put me off, or if they were merely big at a time when I wasn't reading much chick lit at all, but one way or another I was never tempted to pick them up. After that. I likely relegated her name to that series alone and never investigated any further. Silly me. But. I began seeing reviews of her latest, I've Got Your Number ,  popping up here and there. Ari's review over at Emily and Her Little Pink Notes in particular caught my eye (as her reviews are wont to do). So (and this is becoming a familiar refrain), when it popped up on NetGalley I just went right ahead and hit request. As far as covers go, I'm liking this one. I love the silhouettes, the text bubbles, and the font. More importantly, I think the cover overall accurately gives the reader a sense of what she will find inside--a phenomenon that seems to me to be becoming rarer t...

Retro Friday is a weekly meme hosted here at Angieville and focuses on reviewing books from the past. This can be an old favorite, an under-the-radar book you think deserves more attention, something woefully out of print, etc. Everyone is welcome to join in at any time! I felt like something light today for this edition of Retro Friday. It's been awhile. Quite honestly, life is abundantly busy these days. And while my reading hasn't slowed down, I tend to hibernate with an old favorite when real life gets real. So I may have been forgoing some of the new stuff in favor of doing a little re-reading a la Megan Whalen Turner these days. I also made time to re-read one of my favorite Kristan Higgins books on account of it being repackaged and re-released this week in a glossy new edition to match her others. Catch of the Day was originally published in 2007 and was Higgins' second book. I had already read a handful of her books before finding Catch of the Day , and I ...

I'm pretty sure I ran across Jill Shalvis as part of a list of recommendations for people who enjoy Kristan Higgins books. As that would very much be me, I decided to investigate the matter. And you know what? The woman has written an absolute crap ton of books! Where to start, where to start? I finally settled on the first book in the Lucky Harbor series, Simply Irresistible ,  as a nice little point of entry. I was encouraged by the fact that the covers and titles for this series feel like they hail from the chick lit end of the romance spectrum, and I still feel like I'm getting my feet wet, so to speak, when it comes to those genres. Several people I trust on Goodreads seemed to be keen on it, which is always a plus and an excellent indicator of where I'll fall, so hello Lucky Harbor it was. Well, I made short work of the three books currently out in this series, and I'm happily awaiting the next three on the horizon. In retrospect, I think this series is defin...

It's taken me forever to get around to reviewing this one, and I feel bad about that, because I don't want that lag time to be a reflection of my reaction to it. At all . This is actually the second Kristan Higgins book I read immediately after inhaling All I Ever Wanted a few months back. It's also her newest publication, and I was interested to see if I liked her new stuff as well. You know how sometimes you really connect with an author's work from a certain "period," if you will? And then some of their other works don't quite do it for you? I really hoped this wouldn't be the case with Higgins. Given how blissfully I fell into my first of her books, I had all sorts of appendages crossed for more of the same. I knew she had a huge fan following, but I also knew that (much like Jennifer Crusie or Julie James ) people seem to really have their favorites and the ones they just didn't like much at all. Case in point, I thought  All I Ever Want...

I picked this one up based on the recommendation of the trusty Emily of Emily and Her Little Pink Notes  (may she blog again soon). Prior to Emily's review I'd never heard of Kate Saunders before and so went in knowing next to nothing but that it was a rather obscure British chick lit and Emily was awfully fond of it. And that's essentially enough in my book. I had a little trouble finding a copy, but then my Christmas elves came through for me once more and I received a copy of  Bachelor Boys as a gift this year. I'll tell you, I've just been in the mood for these kinds of books lately. And by lately, I really mean since the beginning of the year. Smart, sassy, beleaguered women, up to their eyeballs in the competing forces of work, family, dating--or the extreme lack thereof. I don't know what it is. But these witty, artful, and sometimes emotionally wringing British stories have just been doing it for me in spades. Cassie grew up next door to a home. Her m...

I'm still just a little bit protective of my feelings over this book. Do you ever feel that way after finishing a book that completely threw you for a loop (in the very best way)? I feel distinctly protective of our relationship, the book and I. I'm still mulling over the way things ended on my lunch break and as I lie in bed waiting to fall asleep. Because it took me by such surprise, and because I fell in love with it so fast and hard, I'm just not at all sure I'm ready to talk about the experience. But enough of my book reviewing eccentricities. I've held onto my feelings long enough and it's time to let them see the light of day. Because Unsticky did a bit of a number on me. This is my first foray into Sarra Manning 's body of work and I'm kicking myself for waiting so long to find out for myself what the rest of you have been going on about. For those of you not familiar with her work, Ms. Manning is known for her contemporary young adult titles, w...

I've been hearing about this book for what seems like awhile now. I'd never run across it until Ari from Emily and Her Little Pink Notes started talking it up as a diamond in the rough. She has such similar taste to my own that I rather suspected at that point I would someday be seeking this one out. Then Lit Snit featured it on their BBAW Unexpected Treasure post  and those suspicions turned into beliefs. Finally I broke down and searched my library's catalog. They had it in! So I grabbed it on my way to work that day and settled into bed with it that night. I went in expecting chick lit with a splash of art history thrown in for good measure and I read it in one sitting that night. Jane Laine works for the most notorious art gallery owner in Manhattan. Possibly in the whole of the art world. She remembers a time when she loved and understood art and why it pushed her into pursuing a degree and a career in the field. But almost every ounce of joy in what she does has be...

Whiskey Road is a perfect example of a book I might never have run across were it not for an unexpectedly fortuitous meeting of two like-minded bibliophiles. Herein also lies a lesson on the beaten path. How many times do we walk into the bookstore and head straight for the YA section or the mystery section or the scifi aisle? And we don't venture into other aisles full of different spines and stories. I ran into Karen Siplin on my first trip to BEA and we discovered we have nearly identical taste in reading material. With the possible exception of Richelle Mead 's Vampire Academy series. The jury's still out for me on that one. (Team Adrian!) But we became fast friends and I was eager to read her books after heading home again. I picked up Whiskey Road one evening several months ago not knowing what to expect and in the mood for something different and involving and good . Happily, it turned out to be everything I hoped it would be. All Jimi Anne Hamilton wants is to ...

I'm going to warn you upfront that I had an extreme reaction to this book. An extreme and unexpected reaction. Just ask DH . He had to listen to me rant ad nauseam until I'd exorcised the demons enough to move on. The thing is I haven't reacted so strongly to a book for quite some time and it took me a bit by surprise. Oh, well, who are we kidding? It threw me for one hell of a loop and I had an extremelyhard time shaking it off. Despite all this I'm going to try to continue my tradition of spoiler-free reviews and, as a result, won't be able to tell you the precise reasons why I reacted the way I did. I won't be able to go into excruciating detail explaining exactly how and when my emotions bounced back and forth. But let's be honest. That's probably for the best. So. Becky Jack is a Mormon housewife living in Layton, Utah, pregnant with her fourth child. She has just sold a screenplay to a film agency in LA and is meeting them there to sign the contr...

After reading (and loving) Liza Palmer 's second book, Seeing Me Naked , I had high expectations for her first novel . Conversations with the Fat Girl was not a disappointment. It follows lifelong "fat girl" Maggie who works at a coffee shop even though she has a masters degree in art restoration. Maggie is also hopelessly in love with Domenic--a 28 year old coffee shop busboy who moonlights as a doll maker. But she's afraid to let him get too close for fear he will see her "Area" and lose what interest he seems to have. At the same time, Maggie's best friend and former fellow fat girl in crime, Olivia, is getting married. One gastric bypass surgery later, Olivia is now a size 2. As they plan the wedding together, Maggie begins to realize that after dropping all those dress sizes there is very little of her formerly witty and fun loving best friend left. As opposed to Elisabeth from Seeing Me Naked , Maggie has a wonderfully supportive family around w...

Another great Meg Cabot recommendation . Last time she led me to the funny and quirky novels in verse of Sonya Sones . Now I find myself completely immersed in Liza Palmer 's second novel, laughing out loud, wiping tears from my eyes, as DH stares at me warily and scoots a bit closer to the far side of the bed. The title, cover, and marketing indicate your standard chick lit fare. But I found Seeing Me Naked to be a distinct cut above the rest. Elisabeth Page is a pastry chef at the most exclusive restaurant in L.A. She chose the culinary arts as a way of escaping the overpowering influence of her father--a double Pulitzer prize winning Norman Mailor/Truman Capote/Ernest Hemingway composite. Elisabeth and her big brother Rascal (full name: Raskolnikov. Yeah.) have spent the majority of their privileged lives trying to get out from under dad's shadow. As a favor, Elisabeth donates a set of baking lessons at an auction for one of her mother's charities. Enter Daniel Sulli...