book reviews!

-Undomestic Goddess, by Sophie Kinsella: another by the Shopaholic author. Her best, I thought. Unfortunately, also one with skippable pages. The story of a modern woman learning the simple joys of domesticity was very enjoyable though. It also had Kinsella's typical "I Love Lucy" plot, i.e., heroine lies and gets in an ever-bigger pile of trouble that's bound to topple on her head at any moment, to the great entertainment of the reader.

-Worlds Collide, by Allison Strobel: the fun thing about this one was that I didn't know that this was a Christian novel when I picked it up. It said on the back that spirituality was one of the big issues in the characters' marriage, and I was interested in seeing how that played out.
How it played out was Christianity. Turns out the author is Lee Strobel's daughter. But it was a good read. As in: "this has good theology. this is a good read. Both at the same time. wow!"
However, I would have liked the whole book better if it had ended one line sooner. The last line made the whole thing sappy. So read it, and skip the last line.
:)
Oh yeah, plot. It's about a Hollywood star who falls in love with an ordinary girl. So, by good read, I mean, good beach read.

-The Gilded Cage, by who knows?: this is yet another novelization in the tradition of The Red Tent. Better than The Red Tent, but if you want to read a good novelization of the life of Esther, I'd recommend the young adult novel Behold Your Queen before I'd recommend this one. This one was well-researched, did not make God not God (as many of these novelizations do), but was still rather soul-less and depressing. Which is a too bad thing to do to such a triumphant story.

-The Friendly Persuasion, by Jessamyn West: this one: read. No reservations. Excellent literature. Immensely enjoyable. Really, really, really good. I want to read more by this woman just because I have , after this one book, such a great respect for how she views the world, and how well she can portray it in her fiction.
It's about a Quaker woman and her husband, and their children. Ordinary subject matter, but really extraordinary writing.
I don't know what else to say. It's good.

-Seven from Heaven, by who knows: this is about the McCaughey septuplets. Very light reading, but a fascinating story. It's amazing the medical miracle that these kids were, and the book gives an inside view of what it's like to be the center of a media circus, which is also interesting.

-Dare to Discipline, by James Dobson: helpful. I didn't agree with all of it, but it was a good addition to my research into parenting.

-Couplehood, by Paul Reiser: this was a book on tape, read by the author (who you probably know from Mad About You). If you liked his tv show, you'd probably enjoy his books, especially on tape. Very fun to cook to.

-and for my friends who also like Regencies, I read one by Jeanne Savery, and it was fun (and clean). So there's a name to add to your library searches. To those of you who don't like Regencies, don't bother. It'd be like a sports fan telling me about his favorite sports author. :D you have to like the genre for itself, because the books are extremely silly. but if you have a native taste for the genre, they're also extremely fun.


and that's the most interesting stuff from my recent trips to the library!

except for The Friendly Persuasion, which was a recommendation from my mom. Which tells you the value of recommendations versus browsing.