basball wackiness

The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim?

Yeesh.

book review -- Thirtynothing

I snagged a handful of books from S, my chick-lit lending library, at her New Year's party, and just finished the first of them, "Thirtynothing" by Lisa Jewell. It's a book I kept looking at in libraries and bookstores and thinking I should read, so I borrowed it eagerly. Unfortunately, I found it something of a disappointment. I spent about the first half hating it violently and almost gave up on it. It did settle down eventually, and I liked the end well enough, but I don't know if I'll read anything else by the author.

It's one of those stories in the "you're my totally platonic best friend except I'm secretly in love with you but I can tell without trying that it would never work out between us so let's not bother even though everyone we know thinks we're a couple already" genre. Those work for me sometimes ("When Harry Met Sally" being the prime example), but in this case, the hero had the self-awareness of a hamster, and the heroine was even worse, and that's the obstacle that keeps them from being together. It kept me from having any sympathy for either of them, even when one gets re-involved with an ex who is clearly a scam artist, or a drug dealer, or a pathological liar, or all of the above. Sometimes I can enjoy stories where I can neither identify nor sympathize with the characters, but in this book really it got in the way.

I did enjoy the writing style -- Jewell has a way with metaphors that I liked.