Connie's Summer Reading List Review

My summer ended last Thursday at 8:45am.  That's right.  School started!

I'm pretty proud of myself for reading 7 out of 11 of the books on my summer reading list.  How did you do?

Did you see Mim's Summer Book Review?


Jeneration X by Jen Lancaster

Jen Lancaster could write about the phone book and it would make me laugh.  Sometimes I think she's reading my mind.  This book is about Jen trying to finally grow up and of course, it ends up funny!


Let's Pretend This Never Happened: (A Mostly True Memoir) by Jenny Lawson

Pee your pants funny!  I read several of the chapters to my husband and he laughed too. His favorite chapter is the one where she talks about working in HR and guys that email pictures of their little friend to people.   I'm a little put out that she ALSO had a pet raccoon as a child.  I thought that was MY claim to fame.


celebraTORI: Unleashing Your Inner Party Planner to Entertain Friends and Family by Tori Spelling

I love throwing parties and I love Tori.  She's got some good ideas in here but they aren't as budget friendly as I'd like them to be.


Seven Year Switch by Clair Cook

I enjoyed this story about a woman whose husband up and leaves to join the peace corp. He leaves her and her young daughter and they make a new life for themselves.  And then he comes back.  Seeing how she deals with it and in time finds out new things about herself.  I was torn about how I wanted the book to end.

Taking the Leap: Freeing Ourselves from Old Habits and Fears by Pema Chodron

I wanted to like this short book.  But it was too new agey for me.  They lost me with all kinds of mumbo jumbo about shenpa.  I did read a few helpful things about making friends and fully feeling your feelings, but I skimmed most of the book.


White Girl Problems by Babe Walker

I couldn't finish this book.  Maybe I'm getting too old for ridiculousness and people that do stupid things.  I didn't like Babe and I actually wanted to run her down with my car.


Best Friends Forever by Jennifer Wiener

This was our book club selection for July and I really enjoyed it.  I could relate to being the uncool kid with a popular friend and was really curious how this little caper was going to turn out.  In our discussion on the facebook group, many people said they didn't like the ending.  I think I must be a sucker for a happy one, so I didn't mind it.


I did add ONE book at the last minute but I'm not telling you about it until September.  Stay tuned!

Summer Reading List for MiMi - Semi Complete

Connie and I both posted our summer reading lists back in May. Wow, it's been 3 months already!!

Mine is here if you wanna take a gander.

If not, here's the list I had:

Smokin' Seventeen by Janet Evanovich.
Done! I love the Stephanie Plum series, it's easy and breezy to read, pretty funny and just total fluff for me. Also I sort of want to be Stephanie Plum. Big hair and all! I think I am actually a Jersey girl at heart even though I've never been there.

Dead in the Family by Charlaine Harris. (a Sookie Stackhouse book.)
Done! Man, do not spend a lot of time between books in this series. I had read the book preceding this one years ago and was sort of lost for a couple pages in there. Still a good series, though, and I have to say that if you watch True Blood you are missing out. The books are really NOTHING like the show. The show is skeevy. There. I said it.

Broken by Karin Slaughter.
Done! I love, love, LOVE Karin Slaughter!! Her books always, always take some turn that I didn't foresee. Which is weird because most books follow a formula and you figure out "who done it" way early on, which irritates me.

Jeneration X by Jen Lancaster. (in case you don't remember or haven't been keeping up, this was our pick at the beginning of summer!)
Done! Freaking. Hilarious.

Best Friends Forever by Jennifer Weiner. (this was another book club pick, the one we just finished up.)
I love Jennifer Weiner. She's a good writer and I love to say her last name, which, by the way, is totally pronounced the way you would think, I saw her in an interview talking about that once. Anyway, the book was great with really descriptive narratives about places and people. Character development is always good with this author. The only thing was that the ending was too cookie cutter perfect. Way overboard, In my opinion.

Fifty Shades Trilogy by E.L. James.
Not done. The entire reason that I haven't read these books are because I don't have them and I just refuse to pay upward of $30 to buy them in paperback or download on my Kindle. Especially since I heard they're really bad writing. But. I'm determined that I will read them somehow. I love to read and I want to know what the heck everyone is talking about! I also want to understand those ecards about Christian Grey on Facebook. I also hear tales of a hamster and you know I gots to know what that's about!

So there you have it...my summer reading list and how I did on it.

Did you read all of the books on your summer list? Did you even have a summer list??