My Friend Writes a Chic Lit Book

I'm mourning the ending of my A.M. Holmes book, lost and wandering without anything to read but Star's crossword puzzle and Suduko, when I get an email from a long silent friend that her new book is now available in stores and on Amazon! I think she's been holed up for a while editing it!

Right Before Your Eyes, by Ellen Shanman, stars Liza, a spunky and spirited Yale graduate who intends with all certainty to become a famous playwrite. High rent and other costs of living in this insanely expensive city drive her to being a temp in an office. Liza has a goofy friend, two roommates, and a wicked tongue. She's smart, educated, and doesn't suffer fools gladly. Her world begins to shift when in the short span of a few days she meets a Wall Street baron who, when she falls and twists her ankle, he stays with her in the ER until she kicks him out. That's not all of the love interest your going to get. She asks out the ER doctor, a person lacking in passion but good husband material, and then is contacted by a struggling young director who wants to produce her play.

Dream come true? This will be a read for summer.

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This Book Will Save Your Life

It's 10:30pm and I am in PJs, face washed, contacts out, waiting to relax. I'm drinking Tension Tamer tea while sitting on my velour couch, looking around me, no bright light of the computer staring up at me (but there is now), no online crusades to concur, just life to live in my living room before going to bed in a relaxed state, as I think may be suggested by the book, This Book Will Save Your Life, by A.M. Holmes.

But I'm lonely because I finished the book! This is why I don't finish books. Because they end and there is no more of them, unless you read it again, but the fresh feeling of turning unknown pages is gone. But let me say this: it was a most unexpected action-packed self-help fiction book. And I actually laughed out loud. Twice. Holmes is quite funny. Almost in a Steve Martin sort of way in Shop Girl.

This Book Will Save Your Life was a surprise read that I bought purely because the title was so declarative. I was really checking out A.M. Holmes because I had vaguely heard about her, and this book was available. I don't think my life needs to be saved at the moment, but it did revive my desire to read fiction vs fantasy (Narnia, Potter) or non-fiction (Fast Food Nation, Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire). It also made me very hungry for donuts and for healthy meals prepared by a nutritionist.

It made me want to see Malabo and listen to LA people say weird things like "I'm no-carb." In fact, it has revived my desire to move, and not just to a calm, "affordable" place, but to take the adventure and maybe live back in Charleston, SC on the beach. Lots of other people do it, and it's in the right time zone.

So if you're looking for a good fiction, read This Book Will Save Your Life. It made my life more pleasant, that's for sure. And I think it allowed me to buy myself some Jasmine Rose perfume from Fresh that I've been longing for for a year after they sent me a sample. I promised myself that "when I launch katie-james.com," I would treat myself. Then it became "when I have my first sale from katie-james.com." Then it became "Why spend the money? Put it back into the business! Oil of Olay is just fine."

Let's put it this way: it made the guilt-free allowance of spending money for happiness a lot easier. And not in a shop-a-holic kind of way. The main character of the story was a man. But you know, it's cool, because now I can add another book to my list of "Favorite Books" in different online profiles that I'm always so self-conscious about filling out.

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Beach Read: The Booster

Wriggle into a bench on your favorite subway train or relax in your favorite sun chair with The Booster, by Jennifer Solow, but prepare to curl your toes and sweat a bit more than you would have as Jillian Seigal folds a Hermes scarf into her hand and exits a sensorless boutique while talking to the salesgirl. Oh yes, Jillian is a professional shoplifter. Sort of.

Hitting the bottom of the barrel of her high powered Manhattan ad agency job, Jillian doesn't do shopping therapy. She does shoplifting therapy. She's so good at it, you may actually steal something yourself just to see if it works. Jillian is one wacked out Manhattanite with a sexy photographer boyfriend, Alex, who can do nothing but love her while she squirms in her own confusion.

Solow does a heck of a job writing a torrent love affair with designer anything, like Louboutin boots, worshipping "deliberate colors like tobacco and pale lavender." And her obsessions don't stop there. Can we say "chin hairs" and a potty mouth? She’s a great writer, and a delight to read, especially for this genera, which I haven't read in a while. We also get a glimpse of carefully groomed shoplifting rings and meet interesting (and likable/nonlikable vs cardboard cutouts) characters along the way. If you want to take a designer jaunt around the city while Jillian figures out what to do with her life, read The Booster. It's a quick read, I promise.

But most importantly, Solow is a debut author, and she hit a bestseller list - in San Francisco - in June. Yay!!

Buy now from Amazon. It seems to be 35% off...

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