1. Love Walked In By Marisa De Los Santos: This book had been gathering dust on my nightstand for MONTHS and I honestly don't remember where I bought it....I think the second hand store, but I can't confirm. Either way, I thought I better give it a shot so that I knew I didn't waste the money I had spent on it. Really cute read. Very very funny narrator voice that sucked me in from the first chapter until the end of the book. This book is also told from two different views and those are my FAVORITE as referenced HERE. It's an unexpected love story that has some plots turns that you won't see coming. I don't know if the maternal relationship that occurs between the two narrators drug me in (likely) or the funny prose, but either way I enjoyed it a lot.
2. Heaven Help Us By Herbert Tarr: This book. HYSTERICAL. I found it in a very large pile of old books when I was visiting my friend's family and their community book fair. This book is the Jewish version of "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" meets "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever." I could NOT stop laughing. I will admit it took me longer to get through this book, but only because I tend to read the books to myself out loud in my head and rabbi man voice didn't come as easy as froo froo lady voice. Overall, I was so glad I read it because I laughed and laughed at the cultural differences that exist in the religion of Judaism, but also the era it was writtnen (1960's). When the most scandalous event of the book is a fashion show among the church ladies and they model bikinis and crop shirts I thought I was going to fall out of my chair.
3. Mr. Darcy Broke My Heart By Beth Patillo: This book is the 2nd of a trilogy of books that the author has written with a Jane Austen theme. I discovered that she had written more when I was trolling through a local library. I was really pleased to know that she had written more books because I LOVED her first book, "Jane Austen Ruined My Life" which I talked about in the first edition post. I admit, I'm a total Darcy LOVER and I was semi-skeptical that she would make him into the bad guy. It provided some deep thought on how and why the characters were written in the original novel and was a great story and light read.
4. The Dashwood Sisters Tell All by Beth Patillo: The third and final book written in the trilogy and by far my favorite. I will tell you that you can easily read any one of Ms. Patillo's books and not get lost as to how she shapes her plots around Jane Austen's original characters. They are modern tales and the plot line in this one really spoke to me. For those of you who have read and/or watched "Sense & Sensibility" you'll know that the sisterly relationship isn't always favorable. In fact the younger sister gets really tired of her older sister being the bossy pants regarding her love life and inheritance prospects, etc. etc. etc.....in case you were unsure...that's all that mattered then (TOTALLY different feminist-laden topic for another day). I will openly admit that my relationship with my next youngest sister has had it's really rocky patches, but we have mended and our friendship is one that I value so greatly. It also doesn't hurt that she is married to the goofiest, most glorious man on the planet who we are never letting out of our sight. Family relationships can be tough, but with a little bit of effort and a TON of patience, it can be done. There is a quote that I really loved from this book that I wanted to share. It said, "All along we had been looking for the wrong thing. We thought we were supposed to unearth some big secret between the sisters, but it had never been about the secrets they had kept from each other, but they kept for each other." A bond between sisters is fierce and this book made me even more grateful for the two goofy sisters and one amazing sister-in-law that I've been blessed with in my life.
I hope that these itty bitty blurbs give you some inspiration for your next read. If you didn't catch my last post, it is a review about another beachy read called "The Atlas of Love." You can read that by going HERE.
The moral of the story: Sometimes the tallest, sweetest glass of lemonade in the lemony suck of life is a beachy read to let your brain wander and relax from the hellish reality of adulting. Here's to froo froo lady voices in our head and lots of school girl giggles in our beds WELL past our bedtime.
Until next time, my lovelies!
-R
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