A smart, funny, and fast-paced book about sex, love, body image, and friendship.
An unlucky-in-love woman takes a vow of celibacy as she reflects on her sexual adventures and mistakes in this debut novel.
Natalie has never had a problem finding sex. Finding a meaningful relationship that doesn’t leave her unsatisfied or miserable? That’s a different story. After one especially terrible “relationship” crashes and burns, Natalie decides she needs a break from all things romantic. So, in hopes of avoiding the same mistakes in the future, Natalie looks back at her past. Starting in the ninth grade, she examines each sexual or romantic experience and tries to figure out what keeps going wrong. But Natalie’s quest for love isn’t the only thing going on in her life—she also has an increasingly busy career. As a fashion producer with a background in design, Natalie is used to dealing with models. But when a mistake leads to her actually becoming a plus-size model and she steps out onto the runway, she’s amazed at the opportunities that appear. Through it all, it’s easy to root for Natalie as a funny, quick-witted, and completely human heroine. Although her looks back into her past are primarily concerned with romantic escapades, she also faces her relationships with her body and her parents. A subplot about Natalie’s blogger BFF is also sweet and entertaining.
A smart, funny, and fast-paced book about sex, love, body image, and friendship.Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-942600-72-5
Page Count: 302
Publisher: Rare Bird Books
Review Posted Online: May 21, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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