23. Deadly Sexy

by Beverly Jenkins

started 5/17 finished 5/20

Must be the warm weather, but I am again on the romance kick. Deadly Sexy is about Jessi Teresa (JT) Blake, a successful, tough sports agents. When her brand new Lexus breaks down on the highway (sabotage by a former employee?), she is picked up by a fine (of course he is, it's a romance novel) truck driver, Reese, who gives her a ride. It turns out that Reese isn't just a big rig driver, but also a former policeman, lawyer and partner in his family's company. He has just been hired by the football commissioner to investigate a murder and it also ties into the events that caused JT's car to break down.

The twists and turns of this mystery/romance were very entertaining, especially when I found out that JT is the sister of Max, the heroine in the last Beverly Jenkins book I read - Sexy/Dangerous. While I prefer her contemporary novels, Jenkins also writes historical African-American romance, a genre that I believe she has on lock. While reading the Author's Note, I discovered that the women featured in the present-time books are usually descendant's of the women in her historical series. Genius! So, when JT mentions her rifle-wielding great-grandmother and the strength she derives from her story, you can actually go and read it for yourself!

22. You Only Get Better

by Connie Briscoe, Lolita Files and Anita Bunkley

started 5/10 finished 5/12

Three stories in one. Perfect for quick summer reading. Each novella focuses on women of a certain age embarking on a new phase of their lives.

"The Perfect Life" by Connie Briscoe is about a woman who is convinced her life is dull. While attending a relative's funeral she is forced to come to terms with her obsession with the past and finally see her current life in a new light.

"Three for the Road" by Lolita Files focuses on a spoiled woman who discovers her own strength after the events of 9/11 and a subsequent divorce.

"This Time Around" by Anita Bunkley tells the story of a woman who undergoes a makeover and after a life of devoting herself to her career, opens herself up to other possibilities.

Of all three, the one by Lolita Files was my favorite. This is curious, because I don't normally enjoy her full length novels. Her story best illustrated for me the transformations that women can make when faced with what appears to be a catastrophe. The main character in Connie Briscoe's tale kinda got on my nerves with her ability to hold onto a grudge. Anita Bunkley's story features an extreme makeover involving plastic surgery and I just don't believe that we need to cut ourselves up to change our lives. I probably shouldn't judge fictional characters so much, but since I am around the same age as the women portrayed maybe I just took the stories a little too personally. It may not sound like it but I do recommend this book, especially for Ms. Files contribution.

21. Orange Mint and Honey

by Carleen Brice
started 5/6 finished 5/10

What a perfect book to review on Mother's Day! My mother passed 10 years ago and she is buried in another state, so this day usually just goes by in a blur of work.
This book made me grateful that our relationship was pretty drama free as we are both pretty easy going people.

Shay Dixon is having such a difficult time in grad school that her advisor "suggests" that she take a year off to get herself together. With no boyfriend or friends to speak of, she turns to her spiritual advisor, Nina Simone, to help figure out what to do. Yes, Nina Simone is dead. But she appears to Shay and tells her to go home.
Shay at first resists because her relationship with her mother, Nona, is pretty non-existent. While Shay was growing up, Nona was an alcoholic and often left her to fend for herself, once leaving her alone for a whole week. As a result, Shay is bitter and resistant to any sort of contact with Nona, but Nina Simone insists that this is what she must do.
Nona has now been sober for 5 years, has a 3 year old daughter and spends her time gardening instead of drinking. No matter how many apologies or olive branches she extends, Shay just can't bring her self to believe in Nona's sobriety and even though she is staying in her house can't bring herself to reconcile with her mother.
She soon finds herself with a boyfriend, her first ever at 25, and starts to open up to life a little more. But when she is faced with a few life-changing events she is forced to deal with all of the resentment and bitterness that she has so far been unwilling to part with.
One of the best novels about mother-daughters relationships that I have read. Having the issues surrounding addiction was a great 21st century twist that many (unfortunately) can relate to.

20. Bringing Home the Birkin

My Life in Hot Pursuit of the World's Most Coveted Handbag
by Michael Tonello
started 4/27 finished 5/5

I have developed quite a handbag fetish in the last 5 years or so. When I was in college the main goal was to somehow get a Lo.uis Vuit.ton purse, and my boyfriend at the time was able to come through with that one (Thanks, Todd). Then maybe ten years later I wanted a Coach purse, and my friend who worked at a department store at the time was able to help out in the discount department (Thanks, Melody). In between those purses and after that, I carried a succession of manly, but attractive backpacks and totes bought mostly from the G.ap. They were big and had lots of pockets & compartments and because I don't have a car, I carry a lot of stuff and they were perfect.

But then the purse market started to realize that there were a lot of women were like me and they started making purses bigger and bigger, with lots of pockets & compartments and they were attractive and still feminine. I started to take notice. The Grandaddy(Grandma?) of them all is the Hermes Birkin bag.

Michael Tonello stumbled upon them by accident. A successful business owner and hairdresser, Tonello decided he wanted a geographical change in his life. When a friend offers him a job with a new company he was starting, he moves to Spain. As luck would have it, the friend doesn't get the financing he needs and now Tonello is jobless and in a multi-year apartment lease in Barcelona. To earn some cash he sells a Hermes scarf he only wore once on e-Bay. The response was so immediate and lucrative that he begins buying up scarfs all over Europe and reselling them on e-Bay to customers in the U.S. (where most of the designs are no longer available).

One of his regular customers lets him know that if he can get his hand on one, she would be very interested in a Birkin. See, you can't just walk into an Hermes store and ask to buy one (as Tonello would soon find out). In most stores they aren't even on display and if they are you will be told that they are reserved. If you are lucky and connected, you can be placed on a waiting list and maybe get one in 2 or 3 years. Always up to a challenge, Tonello was able to come up with a system that netted him lots of bags for resale by traveling to Hermes stores all over Europe and even South America and Japan. He sometimes enlisted the help of others and even wrote a small field guide to the different type of Hermes employee that you will encounter and what strategy to use to ensure success.
Humorous and at times touching this is a good compliment to the Simon Doonan book,
Eccentric Glamour and Deluxe.

19. Enlightenment for Idiots

by Anne Cushman

started 4/20 finished 5/3

Perfect world Toni would get up at 4 a.m every morning to meditate and do several Sun Salutations to energize her and prepare her for her day (which she would navigate effortlessly with no stress).

Real life Toni rolls out of bed at 5:20, hops in the shower, throws on clothes, puts her hair in a ponytail (that's it; thank the Goddess for dreadlocks!), and is out of the house at 5:50 to catch her train. (Although real life Toni got up at 4:30 this morning, not to meditate, but to watch the weather 'cause a couple of tornadoes was rolling through. She was able to get out of the apartment at 5:45 only to find a man asleep in front of the door across the hall - he explained that he was waiting for "Mr. Johnson to come home." Whatever, I told him to remain out of the tornado and kept stepping.)

So, I said all that to say, that I read a lot about yoga and especially enjoy fiction that revolves around the subject. You can read all of the how-to and yogic philosophy books you can but novels give you insight into how people fit the practice and theories in their everyday lives. Cushman, a real live yoga teacher, spins the tale of Amanda, a first year yoga teacher and freelance writer. She writes mainly for a series of books "for Idiots", similar to the Dummies guides. Her editor, wanting to cash in on the current yoga craze going on in the US, assigns her to write a book for the series on Enlightenment, naively thinking that it is something that you can achieve in a few months (it took the Buddha, like, forever!). Amanda, eager to end a back and forth relationship with her "boyfriend", takes her up on the offer and heads to India to do her research.

She crosses the path of an bi-polar, celibate, expatriate named Devi Das and soon they are going from guru to guru to find the meaning of enlightenment. Amanda soon finds out she is pregnant by the man she has tried to put behind her and the trip takes on new meaning.

Just like the character Mara in Stuck in Downward Dog, Amanda finds herself at a crossroads in her life, as many of us do. While some turn to drugs, sex, food and other dangerous escapes, these characters are able to use their existing yoga practice to look within and find the answers and redemption that they need. One reviewer on Amazon.com called this book "Bridget Jones Diary meets Eat, Pray, Love", and I couldn't agree more.

I've Been Tagged

I've been tagged by Cennetta.

The rules:

1. Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open to page 123
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people, and acknowledge who tagged you.


I just finished reading Orange Mint and Honey by Carleen Brice (review post coming soon).

"I...I...didn't mean to hear...You..." I sputtered, getting up.
"You keep...I'll go."
"What in the world is wrong with you?" Nona asked, dropping the distant tone she had been using with me since our fight.

That doesn't do much to tell you about the book, but it turns out to be a funny scene.

I'm tagging Doret, Joy, Janie, Susan, and Theresa.