“I also figured out that what we call our destiny is usually determined by two or three casual decisions, which on the surface usually seem about as important as spitting your gum through a sewer grate.” – James Lee Burke, Jesus Out to Sea
"Walk into the room and own it and say, I am a Democrat, which translates roughly to, I am a badass. When someone says you stand for nothing, rhetorically punch them in the gut so hard they can't breathe. You can do it, because what you believe is the best of humanity. You are the embodiment of all the good this country has done in the last century. You stand for the New Deal. You stand for the Marshall Plan. You stand for the Great Society. You stand for the Balanced Budget. And anyone who questions that deserves to be reamed out for it, because they are standing in opposition to the City on the Hill that has made our country a superpower. They are the ones who feel entitled to greatness. We EARN it. So start earning." -- Virginia Belle, DailyKos.com
“Every word she writes is a lie, including ‘and’ and ‘the.’” – Mary McCarthy
"Most of it is true, too, except that the hero quits drinking and the girl grows up. On the last page, the couple gets married, which is a nice way for a love story to end." -- Melissa Bank, The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing
"You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them." -- Ray Bradbury
"The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears or the sea." -- Isak Dinesen
“This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.” -- Dorothy Parker
Glossary
Bookgirl (noun): A New Yorker in continuous pursuit of the perfect book, the perfect drink, and the perfect week on Weight Watchers.
Sarah (proper noun) My best friend back home. See also My Godbaby Mama
Ella (proper noun) Sarah’s daughter, my goddaughter. See also the great light of my life
Polly Poppins (proper noun) My west coast best friend, and the person I call to ask questions like “Can you tell me how I feel about this?” See also IfYouBelongedHere.com
Sisters (noun, plural) Unless it’s preceded by the word sorority, this refers to any of my four older sisters. I’ll usually only specify which one if it’s important to the story. See also Denise, Celeste, Michelle, and Jean
Diosa (proper noun) My longest-standing friend who wasn’t first forced to be by shared bloodlines. See also LeftSideOfMoon.com
Woonsocket (proper noun) The hometown, where we all met. See also great to visit, wouldn’t want to live there.
New York City (proper noun) My adopted city. See also Why do I live in this wretched city or I love New York, depending on the day
Books (noun, plural) Both my passion and my career. See also Bookgirl’s raison d’etre.
Weight Watchers (proper noun) My weight loss means of choice. See also I’m sick of counting POINTS.
Football (noun) My favorite hobby (watching, not playing). See also Bookgirl’s obsession with Fantasy Football
Since my What I'm Reading list is always changing, I decided to keep an archive in case anyone wants to browse for a good book.
American Eve by Paula Uruburu--Paula Uruburu was my very favorite professor in college. She taught American Lit, and I voluntarily took 8 am classes as an upperclassman so I could have her. Even though she graded English majors down, so I pretty much had to bleed on the paper to get an A-. If I was willing to sacrifice sleep AND my GPA, you know she was good....
Eclipse by Stephenie Meyer--The second book in the Twilight series. Love, love, love it.
Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem--It took me ages to pick this up, but I'm so glad I did.
Tall, Dark, & Hungry by Lynsay Sands-- Book four. And now I've torn through all the ones I bought. Sad face.
Single White Vampire by Lynsay Sands--Book 3. And this one is about a writer and his editor. Oh, what fun.
Love Bites by Lynsay Sands--Book 2. Yes, I'm obsessed. And now Countrygirl is reading them too.
A Quick Bite by Lynsay Sands--A Quick Bite by Lynsay Sands--I actually bought (yes, paid cold, hard cash) for the first four books in the Argeneau Vampire series. And it was worth it.
The Last Patriot by Brad Thor--The newest in his Scot Havrath series is so controversial that a television personality annouced that he was afraid the author would get assassinated for writing it. Yikes!
The Book of Unholy Mischief by Elle Newmark--A historical novel set in Venice. It's absolutely yummy.
Good in Bed by Jennifer Weiner--Until now, I was the only overweight, female 30-something in America who had never read Good in Bed. I loved it, and am trying to figure out why I waited so long.
Strangers in Death by J.D. Robb--The latest in Nora Roberts's crime series set in the year 2065. Coming in only behind Judith McNaught's Matt Farrell, Roarke is the second-best romance hero ever.
Dog Gone It by Spencer Quinn--A mystery with a doggie narrator. Fabulous and laugh-out-loud funny. The rest of you, however, have to wait until fall. Nyah nyah.
Eragon by Christopher Paolini--A friend who shares my love for Harry Potter lent this to me.I don't read a lot of fantasy, but I really enjoyed it.
Rasputin's Daughter by Robert Alexander--The second novel by the author of The Kitchen Boy. He writes historical novels set around the time of the Russian Revolution. They're so good that I can still remember exactly where I was (by the pool at the Mirage in Vegas) when I read the first one.
Walking through Walls-- Imagine if you were just a normal teenager, until the day your father discovered his psychic powers. And then you wrote a memoir about it.
Curse of the Spellmans by Lisa Lutz-- The second book, after The Spellman Files, in the series. If you didn't read the first one, stop what you're doing right this second and go buy it.
Lipstick Jungle by Candace Bushnell--I know the tv show isn't getting great reviews, but it makes me purely happy. And I love reading about smart, successful, independent women with fabulous girlfriends.
Bite Me If You Can by Lyndsay Sands--Not just a romance. Vampire romance. Sigh.
Red Hot Reunion by Bella Andre--Nothing makes me as happy as really well-written smut. I loved her last one, and was dying for this one to come out. It was worth the wait.
Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier--Somehow I never read this classic earlier, but I'm so glad my book club picked it.
Confessions of a Carb Queen by Susan Blech--I normally can't read eating disorder memoirs because, well, been there. Done that. But this one was fabulous.
How to Be Single by Liz Tuccillo--The first novel by the former writer for Sex and the City and co-author of He's Just Not That Into You, coming out next summer. I can't prove it, but I suspect she might have spent some time stalking me and my friends, because how else could she capture what it's like to be single in New York so perfectly? I marked 15 different passages in the first chapter alone, thinking, "Oh, I have to share this with..." Fabulous, just fabulous.
Taming Him by Kimberly Dean, Michelle M. Pillow, and Summer Devon--Sometimes entertaining and smutty is exactly what I'm shooting for.
Upon the Midnight Clear by Sherrily Kenyon--I've been wanting to try one of her paranormal romances for a while, and this one was quasi-Christmas-themed. How could I resist? Hey, sometimes a girl needs brain candy...
Sudden Rain by Maritta Wolff--I read a column in which someone described this as a "literary adult soaper with lots of drinking and deception." Seriously, how could I resist? It totally trumped all the "shoulds" in my reading pile.
Reclaiming Paris by Fabiola Santiago—A gorgeous novel coming this summer about a Cuban immigrant in Miami who changes perfumes every time she changes lovers.