Dune Road by Jane Green

I was in a light Chic Lit mood when I picked out Dune Road. I'd read Jane Green's Jemima J. and found it entertaining and easy. The premise of her latest novel sounded promising. Newly divorced mother of two buys small dream home in Conneticut and tries to rebuild her life. She starts working for a famous, reclusive author who's wife mysteriously died on a yachting excursion years before. Lot's of potential for house fawning (which I love), an illicit murder mystery (which I also love), and a peek into the lives of the rich and famous (triple love from me).

Alas, things turned out to be far less exciting than they seemed. The illicit murder mystery was explained in a paragraph (near the beginning!) and there ended up being too many characters, doing not enough of anything to keep my interest for the length of time it took to read the book. My boyfriend even commented that the book must not be so great if I was still reading it after a couple of days...I think you get the point.

Was it worth the read?
Sure, if you're really bored or in need of some filler in your life. I'd recommend reading Jemima J. first, not groundbreaking, but far more interesting!

Book Bites

• Nooooooo!!!! That was my first reaction to the "Hero Complex" article in the L.A. Times. Then I took a minute to think about it and saw the good and bad sides of this new development. Good: The last two Sookie books will be AMAZING and we'll finally find out what's going to happen to Sookie (something I've been wondering a lot with the last few books). Bad: Duh, no more Sookie! Before the last book (which a lot of people didn't like, but I felt like it brought everything back from a dark, dark place) I thought it might be time for the series to end. After reading the most recent book though, I began to see how this could go on and on and I kind of got used to the idea. Yes the quality would have diminished, but there's something so weirdly comforting about Sookie's world that it's nice to have an opportunity to delve into it once a year. So I guess the countdown is on, maybe we should start bets on how it's all going to end?

A quick list of the last five months

We've been lax on our blogging, but that doesn't mean we were lax on our reading (at least I wasn't...Tory has the excuse of a new job :). I've compiled a list of some of the books I've read over the last five months (in no particular order) with quick blurbs about what I thought of them:



Waking the Witch by Kelley Armstrong
I hate to say it, but it wasn't very good. A first for Kelley, in my opinion. Savannah wasn't fleshed out as a character, it's like she didn't have the time to bridge the gap between her as a teen and her as a young adult. There's a sequel coming out, so I'm holding out hope.

Haunted by Kelley Armstrong
I needed a dose of strong Kelley Armstrong and this book did the trick. Eve is a great protaganist and Armstrong's description of the afterworld is imaginative and provides endless possibilities. Super creepy!

Kardashian Konfidential
Yes I read it. And I loved it. What can I say? I always wanted a Brady Bunch family and I always like reading about what it's like to grow up rich in Beverly Hills.

Mini Shopoholic by Sophie Kinsella
Hilarious. I was worried she wouldn't be able to keep Becky's story fresh, but I was wrong. A super fun read. I'd like to write a post on it if I can remember to do it.

Thirst #3 by Christopher Pike
I missed Alissa. And that's why I enjoyed the book, but not because it was a great masterpiece...I have no idea how he'll be writing a fourth after what happened in this book, but I'll be the first to read it anyways.

My Booky Wook by Russel Brand
I loved it. I didn't love him, but heard good things about the book. Now I love him.

My Booky Wook 2: This time it's personal by Russel Brand
Not as good as the first, probably because it's written in real time. He's too close to what he's writing.

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
Fairytale style writing (without the fairytale ending) of a Dominican family living in New York. A good read.

Loving Frank by Nancy Horan
Interesting, especially if you've ever taken any architecture courses (I have).

The Private Lives of Pippa Lee by Rebecca Miller

I bought this book for $1.99 out of a bargain bin. I liked the cover and I loved the title. It felt like a snowy day book. I wanted it to be one of those fun memoir-like stories about growing up as a girl and I think that's what Rebecca Miller was going for, but it never quite hit the mark. Pippa never rang true. Everyone seemed to think she was amazing, but she never seemed to do anything at all. A lot of the situations she found herself in seemed forced, like Miller was trying to recreate something she'd read somewhere else.

But it wasn't all so contrived. I loved how Miller described Pippa's relationship with her mom in the beginning. Suky was by far the most interesting character and it was sad that her story faded off so shortly. The book itself was too short. The whole thing felt like a movie (which it was) so I thought maybe it translated better on screen. My hopes were too high. The movie was really awful. It was also directed by Miller, which was strange because it had this disjointed feel a movie tends to get when it has too many hands stirring the pot. It turned out that Miller intended the voice of the story to be playful and wacky, judging by the music played whenever Pippa narrated. I was really baffled by the whole thing...how could one person write a book and direct the movie and have both turn out so mismatched?

Was it worth the read?
No. There are so many better girl-growing-up books. Try Catherine Gildner's Too Close to the Falls or Susan Sonnenberg's Her Last Death.