Booking Through Thursday: Reading Repeats with Some My Favorite Chick Lit Authors

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This Thursday’s Question:

What’s the first book that you ever read more than once? (I’m assuming there’s at least one.)

What book have you read the most times? And–how many?

 

The very first book I read more than once was Summer Sisters by Judy Blume. (This was also the very first book I ever cried while reading itJ) I absolutely adored this book. It reminded me of the movie Beaches, chronicling the close friendship of two women, who reconvened each summer for fun, family and fiesta.

Summer Sisters by Judy Blume

In the summer of 1977, Victoria Leonard's world changed forever - when Caitlin Somers chose her as a friend. Dazzling, reckless Caitlin welcomed Vix into the heart of her sprawling, eccentric family, opening doors to a world of unimaginable priviledge, sweeping her away to vacations on Martha's Vineyard, a magical, wind-blown island where two friends became summer sisters...
Now, years later, Vix is working in New York City. Caitlin is getting married on the Vineyard. And the early magic of their long, complicated friendship has faded. But Caitlin has begged Vix to come to her wedding, to be her maid of honor. And Vix knows that she will go - for the friend whose casual betrayals she remembers all too well. Because Vix wants to understand what happened during that last shattering summer. And, after all these years, she needs to know why her best friend - her summer sister - still has the power to break her heart....

There have been other books that I have read twice not always purposefully but by the time I remembered I read them, I kept on reading through because I couldn’t recall the ending and they were highly enjoyable. One example of such books was one I borrowed from the library, Sushi for Beginners by Marian Keyes, last year. The characters all sounded familiar with their unique names, like Ashling Kennedy, Lisa Edwards and especially, Marcus Valentine. Sure enough, about half way through I realized that I had read it a few years prior, but I couldn’t remember the ending so I kept reading on.

Sushi for Beginners by Marian Keyes

 

Prada-wearing magazine editor Lisa Edwards thinks her life is over when her "fabulous" new job turns out to be a deportation to Dublin, launching Colleen magazine. No more jet-setting to the fall collections. No more fabulous parties and photographs in the society pages. The only saving grace is

that her friends aren't there to witness her downward spiral. Might her new boss, the disheveled and moody Jack Devine, save her from a fate worse than hell?

Ashling Kennedy, Colleen's assistant editor, is an award-winning worrier, increasingly aware that something fundamental is missing from her life -- apart from a boyfriend and a waistline. And then there's her closest, oldest friend Clodagh "Princess" Kelly, who is apparently living the domestic dream in a suburban castle. So why, lately, has Clodagh had a recurring urge to kiss a frog -- sleep with a frog, if truth be told?

Finally, other books I have recently decided that I want to read or listen to for a second time. Specifically, one that comes to mind includes a Sophie Kinsella novel, Remember Me, that I read in the Fall of 2009. I loved the book so much that I wanted to see how the audio version sounded as well and sure enough, it was just as scintillating and maybe even more hilarious to hear spoken aloud. I continue on this trend with another Sophie Kinsella, The Undomestic Goddess that I read many years back, and it, too, had a laugh-a-minute audio to entertain every car ride. There are many more books on my To-Be-Re-Read list.

Remember Me by Sophie Kinsella

 

When twenty-eight-year-old Lexi Smart wakes up in a London hospital, she’s in for a big surprise. Her teeth are perfect. Her body is toned. Her handbag is Vuitton. Having survived a car accident—in a Mercedes no less—Lexi has lost a big chunk of her memory, three years to be exact, and she’s about to find out just how much things have changed.

Somehow Lexi went from a twenty-five-year-old working girl to a corporate big shot with a sleek new loft, a personal assistant, a carb-free diet, and a set of glamorous new friends. And who is this gorgeous husband—who also happens to be a multimillionaire? With her mind still stuck three years in reverse, Lexi greets this brave new world determined to be the person she…well, seems to be. That is, until an adorably disheveled architect drops the biggest bombshell of all.

Suddenly Lexi is scrambling to catch her balance. Her new life, it turns out, comes complete with secrets, schemes, and intrigue. How on earth did all this happen? Will she ever remember? And what will happen when she does?

The Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella

High-powered attorney Samantha Sweeting has just made a mistake that could snuff out her career. In total meltdown, she abandons her office and catches the first available train out of London, winding up in the middle of nowhere. Still suffering from brain freeze, she wanders first into a large mansion and then into a job as a housekeeper. Samantha's domestic skills are in severe disarray, but somehow she blunders through sewing, ironing, cleaning, and patching together her life. A winning "undomestic" tale from the author of Shopaholic & Sister

What books will you be reading for a second time around??

50th Follower Book Giveaway Winner: Announced

Thank you so much to everyone who participated in my 50^th follower book giveaway. The winner was chosen from the entries on the original post’s comments (see link below) via Random.org.

I’m so pleased to announce:

She will have her pick from one of 5 Classic Chick Lit books, which are all among my personal favorites.

4 Blondes by Candace Bushnell

Angels by Marian Keyes

Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella

The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger

Summer Sisters by Judy Blume

 I hope you like your new book!! And thank you again to everyone who continues to follow my blog.

 I hope to have many more fun and exciting book giveaways in the future…hey, it’s not that far off from 100…..maybe a giveaway for a 2011 novel for a centennial follower contest…what do you think?!?!!?

For synopses of the books offered in this giveaway for the winner or anyone to read or just view their covers, please visit the original post:

http://lipglossandliterature.blogspot.com/2011/03/50th-follower-book-giveaway-choose-from.html

50th Follower Book Giveaway!!! Choose From Top Chick Lit Authors

      In celebration of my 50^th follower here at Lip Gloss and Literature, I wanted to share my gratitude by offering a book giveaway to my readers. Looking through my collection of books (which is too embarrassing a number to reveal), I thought what better a book or author to give away than one of those that got me hooked on this fabulous genre called chick lit or contemporary women’s fiction. If you’ve been reading my blog since it’s days at Where You Wish Upon A Star, you may already know that the leading ladies who inspired me early on included (but are not limited to) Sophie Kinsella, Marian Keyes, Lauren Weisberger, Candace Bushnell and (probably the earliest) Judy Blume. Since these authors are virtually household names in their genre, I realize that most of their books have been widely read by many so I am offering my readers a choice from a few books by these women in hopes that someone will win something they have not read (or maybe you did read it, but you loved it so much you want a copy for your physical To Be Read shelf or to gift to someone else!). So with a BIG THANK YOU to all my followers, old, new and future, I have chosen from a few of my personoal favorites and here are the books to choose from:

Sophie Kinsella’s Confessions of a Shopaholic

If you've ever paid off one credit card with another, thrown out a bill before opening it, or convinced yourself that buying at a two-for-one sale is like making money, then this silly, appealing novel is for you. In the opening pages of Confessions of a Shopaholic, recent college graduate Rebecca Bloomwood is offered a hefty line of credit by a London bank. Within a few months, Sophie Kinsella's heroine has exceeded the limits of this generous offer, and begins furtively to scan her credit-card bills at work, certain that she couldn't have spent the reported sums.

In theory anyway, the world of finance shouldn't be a mystery to Rebecca, since she writes for a magazine called Successful Saving. Struggling with her spendthrift impulses, she tries to heed the advice of an expert and appreciate life's cheaper pleasures: parks, museums, and so forth. Yet her first Saturday at the Victoria and Albert Museum strikes her as a waste. Why? There's not a price tag in sight.

It kind of takes the fun out of it, doesn't it? You wander round, just looking at things, and it all gets a bit boring after a while. Whereas if they put price tags on, you'd be far more interested. In fact, I think all museums should put prices on their exhibits. You'd look at a silver chalice or a marble statue or the Mona Lisa or whatever, and admire it for its beauty and historical importance and everything--and then you'd reach for the price tag and gasp, "Hey, look how much this one is!" It would really liven things up.

Eventually, Rebecca's uncontrollable shopping and her "imaginative" solutions to her debt attract the attention not only of her bank manager but of handsome Luke Brandon--a multimillionaire PR representative for a finance group frequently covered in Successful Saving. Unlike her opposite number in Bridget Jones's Diary, however, Rebecca actually seems too scattered and spacey to reel in such a successful man. Maybe it's her Denny and George scarf. In any case, Kinsella's debut makes excellent fantasy reading for the long stretches between white sales and appliance specials.

Marian Keyes’ Angels

Maggie has always been the white sheep of the Walsh family. Unlike her comically dysfunctional sisters, Rachel (heroine of Rachel's Holiday) and Claire (heroine of Watermelon), she married a decent man who adored her and found herself a solid career. Where Rachel was reckless and Claire dramatic, Maggie settled early for safety. Or so she believed — until she discovers that her husband is having an affair and her boss is going to fire her. Suddenly, her perfectly organized life has become a perfect mess.

Devastated, she decides the only thing to do is to run for the shelter of her best friend, Emily, who lives in Los Angeles. There, with the help of sunshine and long days at the beach, she will lick her wounds and decide where life will take her next.But from the moment she lands in the City of Angels, things are not quite what she expected. Overnight, she's mixing with movie stars, even pitching film scripts to studios. Most unexpectedly of all, she finds that just because her marriage is over, it doesn't mean her life is. In the end neither the City of Angels nor Maggie Walsh will ever be the same again.

Lauren Weisberger’s The Devil Wears Prada

A delightfully dishy novel about the all-time most impossible boss in the history of impossible bosses.

It's a killer title: The Devil Wears Prada. And it's killer material: author Lauren Weisberger did a stint as assistant to Anna Wintour, the all-powerful editor of Vogue magazine. Now she's written a book, and this is its theme: narrator Andrea Sachs goes to work for Miranda Priestly, the all-powerful editor of Runway magazine. It turns out Miranda is quite the bossyboots. That's pretty much the extent of the novel, but it's plenty. Miranda's behaviour is so insanely over-the-top that it's a gas to see what she'll do next, and to try to guess which incidents were culled from the real-life antics of the woman who's been called Anna "Nuclear" Wintour. For instance, when Miranda goes to Paris for the collections, Andrea receives a call back at the New York office (where, incidentally, she's not allowed to leave her desk to eat or go to the bathroom, lest her boss should call). Miranda bellows over the line: "I am standing in the pouring rain on the rue de Rivoli and my driver has vanished. Vanished! Find him immediately!"

This kind of thing is delicious fun to read about, though not as well written as its obvious antecedent, The Nanny Diaries. And therein lies the essential problem of the book. Andrea's goal in life is to work for The New Yorker--she's only sticking it out with Miranda for a job recommendation. But author Weisberger is such an inept, ungrammatical writer, you're positively rooting for her fictional alter ego not to get anywhere near The New Yorker. Still, Weisberger has certainly one-upped Me Times Three author Alix Witchel, whose magazine-world novel never gave us the inside dope that was the book's whole raison d'être. For the most part, The Devil Wears Prada focuses on the outrageous Miranda Priestly, and she's an irresistible spectacle.

Candace Bushnell’s Four Blondes

Candace Bushnell made her reputation as the creator of the HBO special Sex and the City, based on her book of the same name (based in turn on her eros-intensive New York Observer column). In Four Blondes, she returns with a quartet of novellas on her favorite subject--the mating habits of wealthy sex-, status-, and media-obsessed New Yorkers. These are people for whom a million or two does not make one rich, and who consider Louis Vuitton and Prada bare necessities. Janey Wilcox, for example, is a former model who each summer chooses a house in the Hamptons--or, rather, picks up a wealthy man with a pricey rental. With one movie in her past, her "lukewarm celebrity was established and she figured out pretty quickly that it could get her things and keep on getting them, as long as she maintained her standards." Yet even Janey eventually realizes that what she's getting isn't exactly what she wants. Cecelia, on the other hand, has gotten the ultimate prize: a royal husband. Still, she finds herself descending into paranoia as the Manhattan media circus reports her every flaw. Then there's Winnie Diekes, a high-powered magazine columnist whose marriage flounders as she pushes her unambitious husband to write the book that will make him--and her--famous.

Finally, in the most clearly autobiographical story, a writer gives up on the commitment-impaired men of New York and goes to London to find a husband. There she trolls for the typical Englishman--"a guy who had sex with his socks on, possessed a microscopic willy, and came in two minutes." Bushnell is famous for this sort of sexual brashness, and the book is full of her sharp wit, both in and out of the boudoir. She also clearly enjoys her characters and their misadventures, with one exception: the politically correct Winnie, with her distaste for alcohol, night life, and casual sex, inspires an odd sort of authorial contempt. Otherwise, though, Bushnell's ironic takes on the sexual foibles of the rich and famous are mordant, mischievous fun.

Judy Blume’s Summer Sisters

Judy Blume first won legions of fans with such young adult classics as Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret and Forever, in which she tackles the cultural hot button of teenage sexuality. In Summer Sisters, her third novel for adults, the author again explores the ramifications of love--and lust--on two friends. Initially, the differences between Caitlin Somers and Victoria Leonard (or "Vix," as Caitlin christens her) draw them together: privileged Caitlin is wild and outspoken, beautiful but emotionally fragile, while working-class Vix is shy, reserved, and plain in comparison. After Caitlin selects Vix to accompany her to her father's home in Martha's Vineyard for the summer, the two become inextricably connected as "summer sisters."

On the Vineyard, Vix and Caitlin first find love, then sex--and lots of it. Yet Blume soon moves beyond hot fun in the summer sun, tracing the romantic and familial travails of the two from pre-adolescence to adulthood. Solid Vix evolves into Victoria, an equally solid, Harvard-educated, Manhattan public-relations exec. Unpredictable Caitlin opts out of college and travels to Europe, where she has a string of short-lived affairs with a series of intriguing (in every sense of the word) foreigners. It is only after she returns to the Vineyard that Caitlin does the unthinkable, forever changing both her friendship with Vix and their lives. Blume once again proves herself a master of the female psyche, and Summer Sisters is likely to entertain both her post-adolescent and more mature readers.

Contest Rules:

1.      This contest is open to ALL participants, around the world!

2.      You must be a follower of my blog to participate in this contest.

3.      Post a comment below to be entered in the contest.

4.      Winner will have their CHOICE of ONE of the above listed books.

5.      Contest will be open until March 27^th, 2011, 11:59PM.

6.      Winner will be chosen via Random.org and Announced Monday, March 28^th, 2011.

7.      For extra entries: (Please post a separate comment and link to website, blog or tweet.)

8.      Blog or Tweet about this contest (if you don’t have a blog or a Twitter account, you can post it on Goodreads, Book Blogs or another book related site.)

9.      Link to this giveaway on your blog.

10.  Add this contest to another Sweeps or Giveaway Site.

11.  Follow me on Twitter or (at cgraceh)

12.  Follow my book reviews on Goodreads (cgraceh)

Hope you enjoy and thanks so much for making me smile every time I open my blog to see more of your comments on my posts!

Good luck everyone!

*All covers and synopses provided by Goodreads. All Books in Excellent Condition.*

In Her Shoes: Sisters & Chick Lit

     I co-moderate a book club with another woman on the social networking site, Goodreads. We thought our chick lit book of the month for November would best fit the theme of family; as in, “we are so grateful for family at this time of Thanksgiving”. Interestingly enough, it would seem that most of the suggestions (at least) that came in were on sisters, more specifically than just “Family”. Of course, maybe it’s just harder to figure out what and who a novel is about from titles, covers and summaries, alone. Nonetheless, sisters have inspired Chick Lit writers since the beginning.


     For example, the novel Summer Sisters by Judy Blume, despite its title, is not about sisters but actually it’s about best friends who are so close (especially when they share their summers) that they consider themselves sisters. Then again, I would never deny someone the title of “sister” based on purely biological evidence.



     Some of the more famous sisters in contemporary chick lit novels, include the four Walsh sisters in Marian Keyes’ four-book series, each using one sister for its main focus; Becky Bloomwood’s long-lost half-sister, Jess, as revealed in Shopaholic number four, appropriately titled Shopaholic & Sister; The Smart One and the Pretty One’s Ava and Lauren, a story in which Claire LaZebnik shows how a pair of sisters might have been defined by opposites but a lost contract might bind them together, giving the sisters an opportunity to learn just how similar they actually are; Elisabeth Robinson’s The True and Outstanding Adventures of the Hunt Sisters describes the bond between Olivia and Maddie as they deal with some of life’s hardest lessons; finally, Jennifer Weiner’s In Her Shoes depicts the story of sisters, Rose and Maggie, who sometimes get along and sometimes, just don’t.

      So many people have sisters. They are the women we call in times of distress, the ones we call on in times of celebration. They are the ones we lean on when we get fired from a great job or the one we love packs up and leaves. They are the ones we want next to us on the night of our 30th birthday and to stand next to, tall and beautiful, in our wedding procession. We might fight with her and make up with her later. She could be a best friend, a mother, a daughter or a real “sister”, but at the end of the day, she is the one you cherish the most.

     What does sister mean to you? Do you have a sister? If so, what kind of relationship do you have? Can you think of any sisters in the fiction you read? (Or nonfiction too)? Do you have any “favorite” sisters in literature? Share here!