Book Review: Where We Belong and My Horizontal Life

Here's what I've been reading lately:

Where We Belong
by Emily Giffin

From goodreads:  

Marian Caldwell is a thirty-six year old television producer, living her dream in New York City. With a fulfilling career and satisfying relationship, she has convinced everyone, including herself, that her life is just as she wants it to be. But one night, Marian answers a knock on the door . . . only to find Kirby Rose, an eighteen-year-old girl with a key to a past that Marian thought she had sealed off forever. From the moment Kirby appears on her doorstep, Marian’s perfectly constructed world—and her very identity—will be shaken to its core, resurrecting ghosts and memories of a passionate young love affair that threaten everything that has come to define her.
 
For the precocious and determined Kirby, the encounter will spur a process of discovery that ushers her across the threshold of adulthood, forcing her to re-evaluate her family and future in a wise and bittersweet light. As the two women embark on a journey to find the one thing missing in their lives, each will come to recognize that where we belong is often where we least expect to find ourselves—a place that we may have willed ourselves to forget, but that the heart remembers forever.

My Thoughts:
This was an entertaining, light read. Sometimes Kirby annoyed me, other-times Marian annoyed me. But it was an interesting perspective on life, and especially on family.

My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One-Night Stands
by Chelsea Handler

From goodreads:

You've either done it or know someone who has: the one-night stand, the familiar outcome of a night spent at a bar, sometimes the sole payoff for your friend's irritating wedding, or the only relief from a disastrous vacation. Often embarrassing and uncomfortable, occasionally outlandish, but most times just a necessary and irresistible evil, the one-night stand is a social rite as old as sex itself and as common as a bar stool.

Enter Chelsea Handler. Gorgeous, sharp, and anything but shy, Chelsea loves men and lots of them. My Horizontal Life chronicles her romp through the different bedrooms of a variety of suitors, a no-holds-barred account of what can happen between a man and a sometimes very intoxicated, outgoing woman during one night of passion. From her short fling with a Vegas stripper to her even shorter dalliance with a well-endowed little person, from her uncomfortable tryst with a cruise ship performer to her misguided rebound with a man who likes to play leather dress-up, Chelsea recalls the highs and lows of her one-night stands with hilarious honesty. Encouraged by her motley collection of friends (aka: her partners in crime) but challenged by her family members (who at times find themselves a surprise part of the encounter), Chelsea hits bottom and bounces back, unafraid to share the gritty details. My Horizontal Life is one guilty pleasure you won't be ashamed to talk about in the morning

My Thoughts:  This was quite the interesting book. I like Chelsea Handler...in small doses. I first started watching her show two weeks before I moved out of my Astoria apartment the last two weeks of 2009. I was there alone and everything was already moved out except for a handful of clothes and an air mattress. I camped out in my living room, and stayed up way too late every night thinking about the next phase of my life, and for some reason, watching way too much Chelsea Handler. She's definitely funny, and as we all know, I LOVE reading books about people in television (i.e. Mindy Kaling, Anthony Bourdain, Andy Cohen, Barbara Walters, Tina Fey, Bethenny Frankel, etc.). But, I thought this book was pretty poorly written, and almost too unbelievable. Maybe it was interesting to live a little bit vicariously through her crazy, partying, live-it-up way of life, but me? I'll take my pajamas, tea, and a movie any day.

What are you reading lately?

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