Short reviews of Robopocalypse, The Twelve, The Graveyard Book, The Journal of Best Practices, and Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake.
Read more →
Short reviews of A Grown Up Kind of Pretty, Let's Pretend This Never Happened, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, How To Be A Woman, and The Casual Vacancy.
Read more →
Short reviews of State of Wonder, Take the Cannoli, The Partly Cloudy Patriot, Wild, State by State and Savages.
Read more →
Book reviews: Devil in The White City; After The Quake; Gang Leader for A Day; Dear American Airlines; and Heft.
Read more →
A collection of short book reviews, including: When Will There Be Good News; Started Early, Took My Dog; The Man Who Mistook His Wife for A Hat; Girl In Translation; Curtains; and Game Change.
Read more →Super mini reviews of Olive Kitteridge, Drop Dead Healthy, Steve Jobs, Fun Home and Perfection.
Read more →Mini Reviews of Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, The Book of Joe and Everything Is Wrong With Me.
Read more →A review of Susan Jane Gilman's utterly absorbing and fascinating travel memoir, Undress Me In the Temple of Heaven. I LOVED it!
Read more →A review of Haruki Murakami's memoir about running and being a novelist, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running.
Read more →A review of Anne Lamott's Some Assembly Required: A Journal Of My Son's First Son
Read more →Reviews of Wicked by Gregory Maguire, Skipping A Beat by Sarah Pekkanan and Cruising Attitude by Heather Poole.
Read more →A review of Aron Ralston's real-life survival story, Between A Rock and A Hard Place.
Read more →A review of the audiobook version of Jen Lancaster's memoir, My Fair Lazy.
Read more →A review of Amy Chua's controversial parenting memoir, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother.
Read more →A review of the audiobook of Anthony Bourdain's collection of essays, Medium Raw.
Read more →A review of the adventure/survival book The Ledge by Jim Davidson and Kevin Vaughn.
Read more →Mini-Reviews of three very different books: Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann, I Am Not Myself These Days by Josh Kilmer-Purcell and Three Cups of Deceit by Jon Krakauer.
Read more →Book reviews of books by two comediennes: Tina Fey's Bossypants and Chelsea Handler's My Horizontal Life.
Read more →Mini book reviews of three different books: The Bucolic Plague by Josh Kilmer-Purcell, Gods in Alabama by Joshilyn Jackson and Ten Degrees of Reckoning by Hester Rumberg.
Read more →Three book reviews of The Lonely Polygamist by Brady Udall, Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl, and The Wordy Shipmates by Sarah Vowell.
Read more →Three mini book reviews of The Happiness Project, What the Dog Saw and Born Standing Up
Read more →A review of the Meghan O'Rourke's beautifully written, insightful and candid memoir, The Long Goodbye, which deals with the topics of grief, bereavement and mourning.
Read more →A book review of Darin Strauss's powerful memoir, Half A Life.
Read more →Book review of Jeff Klima's humorous (but gross, graphic and profane) memoir "The Dead Janitors Club." I happened to love it ... but it definitely isn't for everyone.
Read more →A review of Rob Sheffield's book "Love Is A Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song At A Time."
Read more →A review of a diet/exercise book called "The Great Fitness Experiment: One Year of Trying Everything" by Charlotte Hilton Andersen.
Read more →Book reviews of "Complications" by Atul Gawande, "Strangers at the Feast" by Jennifer Vanderbes, and "Backseat Saints" by Joshilyn Jackson
Read more →A book review of an amazingly funny but terrifically raunchy memoir by Rachel Shukert called "Everything Is Going To Be Great."
Read more →A review of Lee Kravitz's memoir, ...unfinished business.
Read more →A review of The Boy Who Harnessed The Wind--an uplifting and inspiring story that warmed my heart.
Read more →A review of Jen Lancaster's weight loss memoir, Such A Pretty Fat.
Read more →A review of Rhoda Jantzen's memoir, Mennonite In A Little Black Dress.
Read more →A review of Michael Perry's memoir COOP.
Read more →A meme concept by That’s A Novel Idea 1 Book you read: “Julie & Julia” by Julie Powell 2 Words that describe the book: Cooking quest 3 Settings where it took place or characters you met: Setting: Modern-day New York City Julie Powell—A disgruntled New York secretary, Julie Powell feels like her life is...
Read more →A book review of Michael Chabon's brilliant collection of essays, Manhood for Amateurs. The book that introduced me to Chabon's genius.
Read more →Bad MotherAyelet WaldmanDoubleday, 2009ISBN: 978-0385527934224 pagesGenre: Non-Fiction Memoir, Parenting, EssaysMy rating: 4 stars Overview For the All in the Family part of the Take Another Chance Challenge, I had to read two books by writers who were related to each other in some way. I chose Michael Chabon (the husband) and Ayelet Waldman (the...
Read more →The Impostor’s DaughterLaurie SandellLittle, Brown and Company, 2009ISBN: 978-0-316-03305-3246 pagesGenre: Memoir, Graphic NovelMy Rating: 3.5 stars The Basic Story The book is a memoir of the author’s struggles to understand her father, who lied about almost everything in his life and screwed a lot of friends and family members. As a result, the author...
Read more →Bright Lights, Big AssJen LancasterNew American Library, 2007Memoir, HumorISBN: 978-0-451-22125-4382 pages This is my second Jen Lancaster book, and I enjoyed it even more than the first one (Bitter Is the New Black). A rollicking memoir by a very funny but bitchy lady, Bright Lights, Big Ass is a bit more free-wheeling than her...
Read more →Title: The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner’s Semester at America’s Holiest UniversityAuthor: Kevin RoosePublishing Info: Grand Central Publishing, 2009ISBN: 978-0446178426Pages: 336Genre: Non-Fiction, Memoir In an effort to spice up my book reviews, I’ve been tinkering with different ways to review books. For this book, I thought it might be fun to review it by paying...
Read more →Title: Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper Author: Diablo Cody ISBN: 978-1-592-40273-1 Publishing Info: Gotham Books, 2006 Number of Pages: 212 Book Category: Memoir The other day when I wrote my review of Her Fearful Symmetry in the form of an open letter to the author, I had an...
Read more →Hosted by That’s A Novel Idea 1 Book you read and/or reviewed this week: Marley & Me by John Grogan 2 Words that describe the book: Dog love 3 Settings where it took place or characters you met: 1. Setting: Early 1990s-2000s, Florida and Pennsylvania 2. Marley—a male Labrador retriever affectionately called “the world’s...
Read more →Title: Lit Author: Mary KarrPublishing Info: Harper Collins, 2009Number of Pages: 386Book Category: Memoir Book Overview Lit is Mary Karr’s third memoir. Her first, The Liar’s Club, chronicled her toxic childhood in Texas and her volatile relationship with her artistic, raging, alcoholic mother and sad, distant, drunken father. Her second memoir, Cherry, covered her...
Read more →Title: Alex & Me Author: Irene M. PepperbergPublishing Info: Harper Collins, 2008Number of Pages: 226Book Category: Memoir, Non-Fiction Book Overview The subtitle for this book is “How a Scientist and a Parrot Discovered a Hidden World of Animal Intelligence—and Formed A Deep Bond in the Process.” I think this sums it up pretty well...
Read more →Title: I’m Down Author: Mishna WolffISBN: 978-0312378554Publishing Info: St. Martin’s Press, May 2009Number of Pages: 288Book Category: Memoir Why I Read This Book This book was my pick for the Judge A Book By Its Cover part of the Take A Chance Challenge. This part of the challenge asks participants to: Pick out a...
Read more →Title: Silverstein & Me Author: Marv GoldISBN: 978-1-59709-151-0Publishing Info: Red Hen Press, 2009Number of Pages: 190Book Category: Memoir Book Overview Shel Silverstein was many things—a children’s author, a Playboy cartoonist, a songwriter, and a playwright. (He is the author of one of my all-time favorite books, The Giving Tree.) One thing he was not:...
Read more →Title: Lies My Mother Never Told Me Author: Kaylie JonesISBN: 978-0-06-177870-4Publishing Info: William Morrow, September 2009Number of Pages: 370Book Category: Memoir Book Overview To say Kaylie Jones grew up in an interesting household is an understatement. Her father was James Jones—the acclaimed novelist renowned for his WWII books, including From Here To Eternity and...
Read more →A bit about why you ought to love Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories and Other Disaster by Jean Shepard as much as I do.
Read more →Title: Bitter Is The New Black Author: Jen LancasterISBN: 0-451-21760-8Publishing Info: New American Library, March 2006Number of Pages: 398Book Category: Memoir, Humor, Non-Fiction Book Overview I usually don’t like to use the blurbs on the back of the book to do my story overviews, but the one on this book is just too good...
Read more →A bit about the wonderful memoir, A Girl Named Zippy, by Haven Kimmel.
Read more →Title: Do-Over!Author: Robin HemleyISBN: 978-0-316-02060-2Publishing Info: Little Brown & Company, May 2009Book Specs: 319 pagesBook Category: Memoir Book Overview The subtitle of this book pretty much says it all: “In Which a 48-Year-Old Father of Three Returns to Kindergarten, Summer Camp, the Prom and Other Embarrassments.” The book chronicles the author’s “do-overs” in ten...
Read more →A book review of Artie Lange's memoir, Too Fat To Fish. I wasn't a fan.
Read more →Title: Family ManAuthor: Calvin TrillinISBN: 0-374-15324-8Published By: Farrer, Straus and Giroux, 1998Book Specs: 184 pagesBook Category: Humor, Family RelationshipsThis book is a collection of 16 essays by Calvin Trillin on the joys and travails of life with children. He has two daughters — Abigail and Sarah — and raised them with his wife Alice...
Read more →A collection of short reviews for Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris, Wallflower At the Orgy by Nora Ephron, The Sister by Poppy Adams, Obedience by Will Lavender, and Memoirs of A Beautiful Boy by Robert Leleux.
Read more →A review of That Went Well by Terrell Harris Dougan.
Read more →Recommending books about happy childhoods.
Read more →Recommending books about the restaurant business.
Read more →Recommending some books that deal with religion, faith and spirituality.
Read more →Recommending books about people taking on challenging quests.
Read more →Books about difficult childhoods.
Read more →Thoughts on Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy.
Read more →