Girls in Trucks by Katie Crouch

I related a lot to Girls in Trucks. Even though I am not a debutante, even though I have never nor will ever live in New York City, even though I don’t have any Camellias that I will be tied to for life, I could just relate to the main character Sarah Walters and her trials and tribulations in this coming of age story.

Sarah grows up in South Carolina and is born into an exclusive old debutante society- The Charleston Camellia Society. She goes through cotillion training and throughout her life the Camellias are an influence. She’s kind of a rebel though doing a lot of things that aren’t too Caellia likeThere are a few stories that take place in SC as she is growing up, but then she move to NYC after college. It follows her along many of life’s adventures dealing with family, friends, and dating.

There was a quote towards the end of the book where Sarah is at a party back in SC talking to one of her ex-boyfriends and reminiscing on how much things have changed. But she says something like “as we looked around we were comforted by the fact that everyone ended up just where they were meant to be.” I loved that.

It is a great story and not too long, so it was a quick read. (I finished it over a week ago but have just been too lazy to write a review.

I give it 4.5 out of 5 stars.

Wolves in Chic Clothing

Wolves in Chic Clothing is one of those books that is like a guilty pleasure- like tabloid magazines or watching The Bachelor. It is full of drama, catty girls, gossip, and the glitzy uppity life of New York's finest.

The story is mainly about Julia who works as a sales girl at Pelham's jewelers. She is asked to deliver a very important package to Lell Pelham on her wedding day and from there things start to change dramatically for Julia. She is offered a position as Lell's new assistant/best friend. She gets to give input on Pelham's jewelry and must be the new face of Pelham. Now she gets to borrow designer clothes and go to extravagant fundraising events and becomes New York society's new "it girl".

However, she is more like a pawn in a game played by Lell and her best friend Polly. They get Julia in to this circle and tell her how to dress and act. It is like a sport for them. Lell and Polly and their little circle is full of gossip and fakeness.

This book kind of made me realize just how damaging gossip can be and how silly girls sound when they are talking about each other behind their backs.

It's a cute, fun read. My favorite character was actually Hope, one of Lell and Polly's friends. She just seemed like she had a good heart and I was rooting for a happy ending for her character.

One thing that annoyed me in the book was how the author's tried to use cool "lingo" or shorten words to make them sound cool. It was so annoying. Do people really talk like that?

Overall I give it 3.5 out of 5 stars. Something good to read on the beach if you don't want to think too much!

The Pilot's Wife by Anita Shreve

My old boss gave me this book to read about three years ago, but I just never got around to it. But then a few weeks ago I saw they were going to play the movie based on this book on Lifetime. I decided to tape it and had a mental note to start this book ASAP. I kind of knew what the big plot line was already, so I don’t know if this biased my view on the book overall.

The story is about Katherine who is married to Jack, a pilot. Jack’s plane explodes over the coast of Ireland killing him and 104 passengers. It is a huge news story and people from the airline, the union, the FBI, and the media swarm Katherine’s house to try to figure out what happened. Robert is the first to arrive and he is from the union. He is by Katherine’s side though almost everything and is a great support for her. At one point I thought they were going to end up romantically involved. Jack and Katherine have a daughter, Mattie, and her father’s death hits her really hard. Luckily Katherine’s grandmother Julia is there to help out.

As more pieces of the puzzle of what happened to Jack’s plane start to come together, Katherine starts to discover secrets she never knew about Jack. They were married for I think 16 years and he kept some really big secrets from her.

The story makes you think about how well you can really know a person. But I was let down at Katherine’s reaction to finding out some of these secrets. I would have been enraged and crushed to find out some of the things she did. But I just didn’t feel that from her.

I give it 3.5 out of 5 stars.

Oh and the Lifetime movie, not that good either.