Author Archive
Best Friends Forever by Jennifer Weiner
I really loved Jennifer Weiner‘s first two books Good in Bed and In Her Shoes, so I was beyond excited to get an email asking if I’d like a review copy of her latest effort, Best Friends Forever.
Here is a quick plot summary from the book jacket:
Addie Downs and Valerie Adler will be best friends forever. That’s what Addie believes after Valerie moves across the street when they’re both nine years old. But in the wake of betrayal during their teenage years, Val is swept into the popular crowd, while mousy, sullen Addie becomes her school’s scapegoat.
Flash-forward fifteen years. Valerie Adler has found a measure of fame and fortune working as the weathergirl at the local TV station. Addie Downs lives alone in her parents’ house in their small hometown of Pleasant Ridge, Illinois, caring for a troubled brother and trying to meet Prince Charming on the Internet. She’s just returned from Bad Date #6 when she opens her door to find her long-gone best friend standing there, a terrified look on her face and blood on the sleeve of her coat. “Something horrible has happened,” Val tells Addie, “and you’re the only one who can help.”
I dove into this book with excitement and was still excited through the first few chapters as I got to know Addie and Val . . . but then I lost excitement as I, well, got to know Addie and Val.
I just didn’t connect with these characters or care what happened to them. I found them both to be rather pathetic in their own ways and cliché at that; needless to say, I didn’t find myself rooting for either one of them.
I also found the plot contrived and strange (unbelievable might be the word I’m looking for here), and I *really* wasn’t feeling the continual back story via flashbacks (I was always taught this was a huge no-no in storytelling and now I see why). When it comes down to it, the actual action in this book would probably fill 50 pages or so–and unfortunately that particular action seemed absurd at times.
All that said, I didn’t have any trouble picking the book back up again once I put it down or even finishing it, which I must attribute to Weiner’s writing; I love her conversational style and storytelling–I just didn’t particularly like *this* story or its characters.
Overall, this is still an OK book for the beach or to pass a weekend afternoon or two, but I’m sorry to say I did expect more from Weiner. If you’re looking to pick up her writing for the first time, be sure to go with one of her first two efforts and leave this one for later down the line, if at all.
I give this three espresso cups out of five, and do look forward to Weiner’s next book.
Love Thursday: To the Bestest Readers!
It’s been a while since I’ve stopped and really thanked all of you for continuing to come and visit me here at the blog, on Twitter @michellefabio, and/or on the blog’s Facebook fan page (seven away from 700 as I type this!).
One of the best things about you, dear readers, is that you talk back. You communicate, you leave comments, you take part in discussions, you share thoughts and experiences, and you even send photos!
Indeed, recently I got some hearts from readers for Love Thursday:
- MOMA cappuccino from A Friend in California (who has contributed before)
- Valentine’s Day Egg by Sarah Dallas (sent by Judy of CoffeeJitters–and yes, this really happened on V Day!)
- Potato Chip Love by Angela in Hollywood, FL
- Winter Heart from the Amalfi Coast by Laura at Ciao Amalfi!
Thank you, photographers, and
thanks also to everyone else who chips (hah!) in to make BE a lively, fun place!
Happy Love Thursday everyone!
P.S. Mosaic was made at BigHugeLabs.
Book Giveaway: The Mystery of Lewis Carroll by Jenny Woolf
One of the best things about having this blog is the frequency with which I “meet” kind, like-minded people.
Case in point: A while back, I got an email from Jenny Woolf, author of The Mystery of Lewis Carroll: Discovering the Whimsical, Thoughtful, and Sometimes Lonely Man Who Created “Alice in Wonderland,“ who wanted to chat a bit about blogging, book promotion, and the like. I quickly offered Jenny space here to introduce herself and her book as I, too, was fascinated to learn about why she chose Lewis Carroll as her subject.
I became even more interested in the back story once I started reading through The Mystery of Lewis Carroll (Jenny had sent me a proof copy). I love biographies in general, and this one about a legendary literary figure who has been portrayed in so many different lights does *not* disappoint. Even though many scholars have written about Carroll, Jenny managed to uncover something that no other researcher ever had before. Fascinating!
Haus Publishing has kindly offered up a free copy of The Mystery of Lewis Carroll for one lucky Bleeding Espresso reader, but you must have a mailing address in the UK, Europe, or the Commonwealth (where the publisher has distribution rights). If you’d like to win a copy and meet this criteria, please leave a comment below by 11:59 p.m. on Sunday, February 21.
I will be announcing the winner on the Bleeding Espresso Facebook fan page and via Twitter @michellefabio. If you’re not a fan or following, please correct that!
Here’s Jenny, who you can also read at her blog, From Somewhere in Time and follow on Twitter @jennywoolf:
I loved Alice from when I was seven, and first became enthralled by her adventures. And I ended up writing The Mystery of Lewis Carroll because I wanted to know more about the man who had created my favorite book.
I started, like anyone would, by reading the biographies of him. But you know, I didn’t entirely believe any of them. As a journalist I’d written many magazine profiles, and I was well used to subjects and their friends trying to pull the wool over my eyes. So I wondered if Carroll had been using the Victorian equivalent of “spin” to hide various aspects of his own life.
I wasn’t thinking of writing a biography at this stage – I just wanted to understand Carroll. So my next approach was to start looking for little-known and unpublished documents that might illuminate him more.
I had some luck when I found his personal bank account, unseen for over 100 years and mouldering away in a bank archive. With my husband Tony, I transcribed, annotated and self published it as “Lewis Carroll in His Own Account,” and the BBC quickly got in touch and asked for a radio programme about it.
I did the programme . . . but I still didn’t think of writing a biography.
No, I wanted to create a highly illustrated, imaginative and colourful multimedia project to describe Carroll – because by now I’d discovered he was actually a fascinating, unusual, likeable, (although tricksy and secretive) person.
But publishers are conservative creatures. In the end, my multimedia dreams evaporated and I ended up writing a biography after all.
Or almost. Actually I prefer to think of it as a portrait. Because it doesn’t start at the beginning and end at the end like most biographies do. Instead, it takes ten important themes in Lewis Carroll’s life, and examines what they meant to him. From Alice in Wonderland to photography, from his little girl friends to his religious and supernatural interests, from his family to his sex life, I hope that it will offer a glimpse of the kind of human, emotional, eccentric and utterly unique person that he was.
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The Mystery of Lewis Carroll was published in the US on 2 February by St Martin’s Press and will be published on 1 March in the UK by Haus Publishing.
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Remember to leave a comment to win your copy! For those not eligible, please still feel free to leave your comment or question for Jenny–or even your own personal Alice in Wonderland memory (please tell me you’re not eligible though)!
If You Know Me Well, You Know…
Inspired by my good friend Frances:
- If you know me well, you know that I am a sucker for fuzzy creatures, I love cappuccino any time of day, and I can’t stand people with inflated egos.
- If you know me well, you know that I am a bleeding heart liberal, I love living in southern Italy, and I can’t stand watching anything with Chuck Norris or Steven Seagal (but can kinda sorta tolerate Jean Claude Van Damme if I must).
- If you know me well, you know that I am a Coal Cracker, I love reading, and I can’t stand water running down my sleeve (just writing that skeeves me out).
- If you know me well, you know that I am experiencing life with baby goats for the first time, I love finding and sharing inspiring blogs and websites, and I can’t stand cold hands and feet.
- If you know me well, you know that I am not happy unless I’m working on several projects at the same time, I love climbing into freshly washed sheets, and I can’t stand that weird feeling when a fingernail is too short.
- If you know me well you know that I am a big fan of pizza, I love (and miss) March Madness, and I can’t stand when I have to pull my laundry in just minutes after I’ve put it out because of rain.
- If you know me well, you know that I am not likely to jump out of a perfectly good plane, I love trying new foods, and I can’t stand mosquitoes.
- If you know me well, you know that I am proud to be all hopey *and* changey, I love castles, and I can’t stand whining.
P.S. All the photos here are, of course, from my trip to NYC in December, during which I met Frances for the very first time in person. Un bacione Francesca!
I would love to read your take on this prompt, so please post yours in the comments or on your own blog/FB/Twitter and let me know!
Buon weekend!
Goat Zen in the Goat Pen
After compiling my part of the World Nutella Day round up and finishing some work assignments early in the week, I decided to enjoy the sunshine this afternoon and spend some time with my girls (of the caprine persuasion).
I never would have imagined how calming and reassuring just being in the presence of these goats can be. It’s really hard to be worried or stressed about anything when these sweet faces are looking back at you.
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Right now I’m reading Goat Song: A Seasonal Life, A Short History of Herding, and the Art of Making Cheese by Brad Kessler (recommended by a reader and native of Calabria, just down the road from me; grazie mille Anthony!).
Kessler describes the connection with nature, history, and yourself that raising goats provides, noting that throughout time, goats have been the subjects of many legends and stories, always “helping humans or leading them to unexpected places.”
“If you follow living beings assiduously in the field, or through the lens of a microscope,” writes Kessler, “they lead you to an understanding of their lives, and all life. They usher you into a kind of Eden.”
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Margherita and Carmelina usually don’t care *too* much if I’m in there with them–they often come to say hello and then just go back to eating, unless they’re not hungry, in which case they’ll stay for petties for a few minutes.
But my Pasqualina, who you might remember, I bottlefed, rarely leaves my side when I’m in the pen, even when I’m clearly disturbing her nap time.
There’s just nothing like goat zen in the goat pen.
Michelle Kaminsky is an American attorney-turned-freelance writer who lived in her family's ancestral village in Calabria, Italy for 15 years. This blog is now archived.
Calabria Guidebook
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