Book Reviews

I Feel Bad About My Neck
by Nora Ephron
★★★☆

This collection of essays is written by Ephron, who is the mastermind behind beloved movies like When Harry Met Sally and most recently, Julie & Julia. She waxes philosophical about everything from purses to parenting. She is honest about the frustrating aspects of being a woman, like constantly having hair removed. In one essay she says she saw an unkempt homeless woman on the street and thinks that she would look exactly like that in very little time if she let her "maintenance" regime go and stopped dying her hair, exercising, etc.

I really loved her essay called "Moving On" when she discusses how New York City is very livable, it's when you leave and try to visit that it feels foreign. I felt that way about London. Loved it, but when you visit later that pub is closed, that restaurant moved and you somehow feel your nostalgia has been betrayed. Her essay "On Rapture" was probably my favorite. She talks about the rapture you feel after reading an amazing book. The feeling of being so enthralled by it that all you want to do is disappear into its pages. I think we can all relate to that.

It was a fun quick read, but didn't leave me thinking anything too deep.

The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner
by Stephenie Meyer
★★★

Bree is one of the "newborn" vampires we meet during the Eclipse book. She's only around for a heartbeat, but this book tells her side of the story. Told from her point-of-view we see what the vampire army was like before they attacked the Cullens. She was in an impossible situation, which quickly spiraled out of control. An interesting glimpse at the Twilight world from the outside, but it's nothing you can really sink your teeth into... pun intended.

**As a side note, Meyer is offering this book for free (to those willing to read it online) until July 7th. Visit this link to check it out.

Tales of the City
by Armistead Maupin
★★☆

The books is a collection of fictional stories about twenty-somethings in San Francisco in the '70s. A conservative young woman, Mary Ann Singleton moves to San Fran from Ohio and becomes friends with a diverse group of people including her pot-smoking landlord, Anna, bohemian neighbor Mona and a sweet gay man, Michael.

The stories read more like a TV show than a book. Lovers are interchangeable and lives overlap as the characters deal with relationships, roommates, jobs and the AIDS epidemic. The writing isn't bad, there was just too much soap-opera style drama for me. Some of the characters are likable, but I found myself not caring too much about any of them.

Photo by moi.