Rhonda

Dnf

I actually had a hard time reading this one, but it was quite short (novella, obv) so I finished it. I understand why it was such a sensation years ago. It was pretty sad.

Not one of my favorite short story collections. I suppose I did like the story of the wife in the penthouse. I thought all of the “you” stuff was super blah. The Tampax story was okay. The book club story was not my favorite.

Well, this is a thing I read. I would not have eat l read it without it being part of a book club I'm in. I read it for the prizes that came in the box.

The main character is unlikable. So is the whole weird family.

The writing is simple and easy to get through. It's not as bad as 2 indicates, but there's no .5 here. 2.5, cos I didn't have to just stop reading. I just didn't really like it.

The book involves a Photographer who makes things up in the pictures she takes to make her life more in line with what she wants, while she ingratiates herself to a family she becomes obsessed with. Honestly, I had a hard time with how the family were like “sure random photographer, please just stay and babysit!” but I suppose maybe that does happen with self-important people...

I don't think there was a story I didn't love. Oddly, the namesake story was maybe my least favorite.

This book is about a community of Punjabi women who are trying to learn to read/write/story tell, but also involves a murder mystery and yes, plenty of erotic stories.

Decent read.

I would give it a 2.5. The dialog is kind of kind a really bad Lifetime movie, but I still wanted to see the children found. All of the love interest was a bit lame. Okay yeah, Jerome. But this lady rolls into town and people just get crushes automatically or try to set her up with dudes at church. The dialog was painful at times. The main character basically speaks in bumper sticker.

I enjoyed the book. It is well written.

However, it did drag on and at times it seemed repetitive. I don't mean the five marriages, I mean literally repeating lines later in the book. I appreciate a good long book, but around the 400th page I really just wanted it to end.

Very well written.

DNF

This was an exceptional book, which I wasn't really expecting. TBH, I didn't know anything about ol' Matthew McConaughey except that he is in one of my top favorite movies of all time INTERSTELLAR.

If I had to take a half a point off it would be that Interstellar was only a blurb in the book, but, whatever. He had me from page one.

Do yourself a favor and listen to the audio version.

There's a lot to go over with this one, but I did enjoy it. Cancer, eating disorders..

At first I didn't love it because, frankly, I don't generally enjoy the “New York” thing and the characters weren't relatable to me at all, but then I found out I was hooked watching this young girl be so damn unhappy.

Would recommend.

dnf - 25%

Jumps around too damn much. Did not enjoy.

OK, this may or may not contain spoilers, so I'll click the button.

I don't often pick up thrillers or whatever you call this, especially ones where people are going on and on about all the sex in it. So, full disclosure, these books don't often appeal anyway. I decided to give this one a spin because it seems to be well-loved after a bajillion goodreads reviews. Here are my thoughts:

1) The writing wasn't as bad as I thought it would be based on the Book Nerds group I'm in on Facebook. I expected a 50 Shades of Grade style shit-show, so I guess I have that to be thankful for. It was super repetitive in the beginning, following all of Lowen's thoughts in the first chapters before she heads off to Vermont which was really irritating. Yeah, I totally get she's this recluse character.

2) After she ends up in Vermont, a lot of the repetition stopped. It was almost like Hoover didn't really know how to introduce her character. Lowen was a pretty one-dimensional character. The reclusive writer, oooh, big deal. Reclusive writer meets handsome dude must be some kind of trope, but again, I don't read things like this generally speaking so I don't know.

3) I don't get the big deal about Jeremy. Reminds me of a bunch of crappy romance-type novels I used to giggle at when I worked at the library. Devastatingly handsome dude, with a platinum penis, who just hates that he's so good looking and irresistible. Whatever. Definite trope.

4) I have never bitten a headboard and I think that would be bad for your teeth as well as your furniture. I kept getting images of Red Dragon in my head and Francis Dolarhyde. Nothing really sexy about that.

5) When Lowen was reading the manuscript, I thought it was kind of funny how tired she got of reading about Verity sucking her husband's dick, because I, too, was tired of reading about Verity sucking her husband's dick. I would imagine that was intentional.

6) So the story wasn't so bad, the problem was the ridiculous scenarios that kept happening. “Oh, can you cling to me up these stairs because sometimes the door shuts and I uhh, don't wanna get locked in.” Cos she couldn't like, stand at the top and just wait for him to get up there like a reasonable person. I guess that's not sexy enough. Basically all of the sexy set ups were weird to me, but maybe I'm just a really boring old married lady.

7) And then the story was bad. The letter at the end. Christ Jesus, when can people just leave well enough alone? Like, I get it, we're supposed to be shocked. Like Girl on the Train level shocked or whatever (even though that wasn't shocking either). But for goodness sake, the twist was telegraphed from ages away. A better twist might have been just not having a twist. Just leave it. Verity is a psycho.

8) Who bangs a dude out and puts a pillow under their ass? Lowen is obviously the most fucked up character of all.

I think I'm done. I wanted to like this book, honestly. I stayed up reading it even. And then at the end, Colleen Hoover was like, “I totally can't resist, I have to write this really stupid letter that you knew I was going to write cos tee hee... clever.”

Whatever. Snore.

2 only because I was mildly entertained for awhile. But honestly, that's kind of generous. Considering.

And honorable mention to Colleen Hoover for making me have to read ridiculous names like “Chastin” and “Crew.” Wtf. I conceived on an air mattress once. I guess that could have gone really badly.

Super meh.

I kept zoning out while reading this. It started off well enough, but by a fifth of the way through I just did not give a shit. But, I'd made it to the point where I figured I should keep on.

Read it through my flight to Florida. Thought things were looking up when they were meeting the revenants, then on to Paris, then back to zoning the heck out.

Couldn't bring myself to care about Claudia. Honestly thought the book was just trashy enough I wasn't sure how the Claudia thing was going to pan out.

It started to feel a little drawn out at the end, but still a 5 star book.

The story wasn't bad, but the writing was so repetitive.

Like all collections, some were better than others but I didn't really find any of them particularly great. I wanted to like it, but I did not. The writing was okay, but I just didn't care about any of the stories. It's hard to care in a page and a half.

This was really not very good at all. Some such people go do rich people things, fuck around, find out. Predictable. The good news is, it's a novella.

I just really, really did not enjoy this book. It was repetitive, telling me again and again things like how someone can't be seen on their cam if they're driving or whatever. The ending was no shocker. The violence wasn't edgy. And the plot holes are about a mile wide.

I wanted to love this book. At times I did. And at other times I was slogging through trying to get to the end of a not-very-long book. I typically love Lauren Groff, I don't know if I just wasn't in the mood for this book or if it was truly, at times, just boring.

I just did not enjoy.

26 hours of audio book is a lot.

I enjoyed this book, but it was really, really long. I commuted to and fro work and cooked a lot of meals while listening to this. Of course we all know Obama has a lot to say and is brilliant, so that will come as no shock while reading or listening. But it is.. a lot.

I can't imagine figuring out how to pair down a presidency, though.

I have placed a 4, but really feel like a 3.75 because it really does sometimes get tedious.

Beautiful book, great writing. A lot of quotable lines.

But Christ was it a bit too on the nose to read during 2021 pandemic year 2.

Bit of a slow book, but well worth sticking it out.