Trifecta

I don't know if I ever really mentioned how much I read, or just the fact that I'm always reading. But I have a back log of books I want to mention... Hell the other week I read 3 books in 3 days. The sad thing is that I can only remember 2 of the books. I was operating as a one woman library for the longest time, I still do, but, thanks to my Kindle (I la-la-love my kindle-words cannot describe the love), I can only tell people about most books now by word of mouth. I remember a while back Tuschka said she needed some book suggestions- I probably rattled off an easy page worth of the most recent good reads I just completed...

Most of my books are of the girly, vagina friendly sorts...ranging from chick lit to smut (everyone needs a little smut now and then)...I try to read 'serious' books too, but I don't read them as often as I should. My brain will turn to mush from lack of serious reading, but sometimes I just want the happy love and nothing that requires me to think or become depressed.

I would like to review for you 3 books that I read (2 of my 3 books in 3 days, and one that took a bit longer). Let's get the book worm party started.

Such a Pretty Girl, Laura Wiess

This is not a happy book, let me say that off the bat. It takes place over a weekend, with the main character's, Meredith, father being released from prison. Meredith is 15, and her father molested her, and he wasn't supposed to be released until she was 18 and out of the house. Meredith lives with her mother, who is beyond thrilled and excited that he's coming home early, at a condo complex, and her dad is supposed to live in another unit and is not supposed to be alone with Meredith at all. Also living in the complex is the police officer that arrested her dad and her 19 year old boyfriend who was a victim of her father (and her dad was having an affair with his mother too).

During the course of the weekend, you get flashbacks of the situation that finally lead to her father's arrest and what their relationship was like prior to the abuse. Meredith does whatever she can to make herself repulsive to her father, who is still totally obsessed with her. He made comments to her about loving the way she walks, how he had written her love letters in prison bus didn't send them because the guards would read them, and how he is looking forward to picking up the father/daughter relationship right were it left off. The mother is in total denial of what he has done to Meredith and countless other children. She is just so happy to have him home and they plan on trying for another baby ASAP (which frightens and repulses Meredith).

Meredith attempts to avoid her dad as much as possible, and is nervous about him coming for her...especially after his condo is vandalized and he's now staying at her's until he can move back. She tells the police officer what is going on, and he gives her a nanny cam system to install throughout the condo, so if dad does try something it can be recorded.

Sure enough, Monday morning, Mom goes to work, and Dad gets frisky. Meredith gets the whole thing recorded, knocks out dad with a Virgin Mary statue, and flees. Dad is going to go back to the big house (when he gets out of the hospital), mom is arrested for having a known predator leaving in her home, and Meredith is sent to live with her grandmother.

It ends happy- but getting there is rather nauseating. The level of obsession her father has for her tagged with the mother's delusional state is shocking. The fact the both parents think that no wrong doing occurred with Meredith or the other children her father came in contact with, was beyond my realm of comprehension.

It's an excellent story. Well written and frightening.


Perfect Fifths, Megan McCafferty

Perfect Fifths is the fifth (surprise, surprise) and possibly the last installment of the Jessica Darling series. I love Jessica. When I first read Sloppy Firsts, I thought it was witty, snarky, well written from a teen perspective. I knew the moment I read "my parents suck ass" from the synopsis, this was going to be the book for me. So I've had the pleasure of reading about Jessica from the time she's 16 to 26.

Perfect Fifths spans only 18 hours of Jessica running (literally) into Marcus Flutie (the ex-boyfriend/love of her life) at the airport. All past books are written as journals from Jessica, this time it's not a journal book, and we get to delve a smidge into the mind of the great Marcus Flutie. Marcus and Jessica haven't seen each other in 3 years, and they recap their lives since they last saw each other.

The most important thing- is that their chemistry and draw to each other is still intact.

Their reunion ends with the way you want it too...and the hope that maybe, just maybe, there might be a 6th book...but if not, that's okay too.

The Makedown, Gitty Daneshvari

This book started off sooooooo superbly. I was laughing out loud, and I felt like I couldn't get through it fast enough.

Anna Norton starts the book off as an ugly duckling with an eccentric family. After college she decides she's going to head to New York, she needs to escape. In NY she begins her transformation from the ugly duckling to a average duck- she's not a swan. While working as a catering assistant, she meets Ben, who is hiring her catering company for a party. Ben's hot, and out of her league. But he shows some interest in her the night of the party, asking her to dance, and this is one of the best lines I have ever read is written: It was my "no one puts Baby in the corner" moment I have been waiting for my entire life. Genius, total genius.

Slowly Ben and Anna start dating and fall in love. Anna finds out that her dad is leaving her mom for his Asian assistant, who her mother calls Ming (even though her name is Sarah). Mom also delivers a blow that dad and Ming are expecting by delivering flowers to Anna with the following message: Your father and Ming are having a bastard won ton. Hope the flowers soften the blow. Regards, Mother. I was almost in tears with laughter.

Anyways- Ben and Anna fall in love, and Anna moves in. It is around this point in time, that Anna becomes extremely jealous of the attention Ben receives from women, and how personable he seems to be in return. She decides that she's going to try to make him down, bring him more to her "average jane" level. And this is were I find the book going DOWN HILL. Anna's obsession with making him down and her levels of insecurity become all encompassing for her. It's disturbing to read...very single white female at times, I felt. When Ben's entire persona changes as his appearance changes, Anna doesn't like what she sees and what's she done to him. She tries to put him back, and instead, he breaks up with her. She attempts to come clean, but it back fires. Ben wants nothing to do with her.

Then we fast forward three years Anna's engaged and she sees Ben (who's returned to his former glory) at a Starbucks, the exchange friendly hellos they introduce each other to their new partners. The End.

It was funny haha in the beginning- then psycho- then POOF over. I didn't like the flow, I didn't like the middle... I really thought I was on my way to book that was going to be added in my top 10, and it flopped... There seemed to be a large disconnect from how the story started to the middle part of when Anna became psycho. I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to finish it, it was so hard and disturbing to read.

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I recommend Such a Pretty Girl...and RUN to go out and buy the Jessica Darling series- you'll laugh, you'll cry, you won't be disappointed. The Makedown is take it or leave it, it was so good in the beginning, if you could just read that, and then put the book away, you'll be happy.

Rock out, literary style...