American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld

This had been on my to-read list for a while. I was drawn to the cover for some reason and intrigued that it was based on the life of First Lady Laura Bush. So when I found La Belle Vie Book Club and saw their next pick was American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld I thought "Perfect!".

This was a big book (over 500 pages). It is broken up into four parts that take place at four different addresses of Alice, the main character, with the last being 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. It starts with her in her childhood home and is mainly about Alice as a teenager.

Part One was by far my favorite part. A major tradegy befalls Alice as a teenager that I could somewhat relate to (although hers was much worse). There were so many shocking moments and it made me think about how all these bright, successful women I look up to were once teenagers and have gone through a lot in their lives.

Part Two is about Alice as a twenty-something working girl. She is a librarian at an Elementary school and like many young career girls, her life is mainly about work. Until she meets Charlie. This section was also pretty shocking and it was a little disturbing to read some of the more intamite scenes and imagine Charlie as George W. The plot lines were good and again I could relate to Alice throughout this section.

Part Three is Alice as a mother and wife of a man from a famous, prestigious family. Even though Alice has faced many challenges up until this point, this is perhaps the most challenging time for her. The plot lines slow down some, but you can see her internal struggles in this section.

Part Four is about Alice as the First Lady. This section was the most disappointing for me. The book had started out so well, but this section fell flat I thought. It didn't ruin the book, but it didn't end with a bang either.

Overall I really enjoyed the book and would highly recommend it. I had to keep reminding myself that this was fiction and not a biography of Laura Bush. And it did make me want to learn more about her, but even if it wasn't based on her, it would still be a great story!

I give it 4 out of 5 stars!

Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis

When I started going to The Summit, I noticed my pastor referenced C.S. Lewis a lot. In my head I was always thinking "The guy who wrote The Chronicles of Narnia?" Little did I know that C.S. Lewis had written a lot of books on Christianity. I decided to read Mere Christianity to see what this craze was all about.

The book was adapted from a series of radio talks he did between 1941 and 1944. What is interesting is C.S. Lewis was an atheist and converted to Christianity reasoning that the "moral law" in humans was not something that humans made up and is instinctual so there must be something behind it, namely God. What he finds interesting is that unlike other "natural" (non-man-made) laws (like gravity), the moral law can be broken or ignored. This was one of the main things that lead him to "theism".

He came to believe Christianity through reason. Based on the life of Jesus Christ, he reasoned that there could only be 3 possibilities: 1- Jesus was who He said He was (the Son of God) or 2-He was blatantly lying or 3-He believed He was God, but really He wasn't (in other words he was delusional). Lewis determined that the latter 2 options did not match up with Jesus' character and therefore the first option must be the truth.

He then goes in to taking a closer look at ethics and behaviors resulting from Christian beliefs. He explores the four Cardinal Virtues: prudence, justice, temperance, and fortitude. He also explores the three "theological" virtues of hope, charity, and faith. He also talks about forgiveness, sexual relations, and Christian marriage, and what he calls "the great sin"- pride. He uses psychological explanations and reasoning to explain human behavior, struggles, and motivations in the Christian life.

Throughout the book he uses a lot of helpful analogies as he reasons through some of the finer points of Christianity. He makes it easier to understand deeper topics and complex theories with his reasoning and analogies.

I really enjoyed the book. The reading was kind of heavy for bedtime and I found myself having to re-read paragraphs sometimes because my brain could not comprehend what he was trying to say. But his reasoning and analogies really helped me better understand Christianity.

I give this book 4 out of 5 stars.

C.S. Lewis has written many books (fiction and non-fiction) and I look forward to reading his work again!

For more info see the C.S. Lewis website here.

Online Book Club!

A few years ago my friends and I formed a book club (we called ourselves "Book Blub" due to a spelling error in one if our email strings!) It lasted about a year before we all got too busy to keep up with it but I really miss the Book Blub!

Last week I found a great online book club!



They are going to start reading Curtis Sittenfeld's American Wife for April. This book was already on my "to-read" list so I went out and bought it and plan on following along the discussions in the Book Club!

Here is a synopsis of the book:
A kind, bookish only child born in the 1940s, Alice Lindgren has no idea that she will one day end up in the White House, married to the president. In her small Wisconsin hometown she learns the virtues of politeness, but a tragic accident when she is seventeen shatters her identity and changes the trajectory of her life. More than a decade later, when the charismatic son of a powerful Republican family sweeps her off her feet, she is surprised to find herself admitted into a world of privileged. And when her husband unexpectedly becomes governor and then president, she discovers that she is married to a man she both loves and fundamentally disagrees with- and that her private beliefs increasingly run against her public persona. As her husband's presidency enters its second term, Alice must confront contradictions years in the making and face questions nearly impossible to answer.

In case you can't tell it is a fictionalized portrait of Laura Bush. I read her other novel, Prep, a few years ago and really enjoyed it, so I am looking forward to this one!

Go get the book and follow along with us!

40% off coupon for Boarders

Here is a great printable coupon for 40% off one item at Borders. Go pick up a new book this weekend! Offer expires 3/28/09.

40% off one item at Boarders

Autobiography of a Fat Bride by Laurie Notaro

Last year I read Laurie Notaro's The Idiot Girls Action Adventure Club and it was one of the funniest things I have ever read. I was super-excited to start this new installment in her series.

I was expecting all these tales of getting engaged and the neuroses that usually take over for brides-to-be. But this wasn't exactly that. It is more of a collection of short stories about meeting and the first few years with her husband. They are really random. But they are really funny. Not as funny as the first book, but still more funny than most.

This is also the type of book you can pick up and put down easily. Each chapter is a new story, so there is no suspense building or anything.

Overall I wasn't in love with it and give it 3.5 out of 5 stars.

Ten Things... by Maria Shriver

A friend loaned me a copy of Maria Shriver's book Ten Things I Wish I'd Known- Before I Went Out into the Real World. I REALLY like Maria Shriver. I think she is smart, relatable, driven, and just an all-around good role model for women. She had this thing last year called the Women's Conference and most of the key note speakers and some of the break out sessions were available through webcast. I listed to a lot of the sessions and I was very impressed. You can view the recorded versions here.

Back to the book- I enjoyed it and it was a quick read. It is based off the commencement address she gave at the College of the Holy Cross. She gives such advice as "You don't HAVE to do it all", "Stand your ethical ground", "Be willing to fail", and "Don't expect anyone to support you financially". She uses antidotes and stories from her life on how she learned these life lessons.

She says "I wrote this book so that you might be spared. Not from having to learn the lessons I had to learn. No one can spare you that, because learning is experiential, and you have to do it yourself. As a wise person once told me: If I could spare you the pain you're experiencing, I wouldn't--because I wouldn't want to deprive you of the strength and wisdom you'll gain from having gone through it and come out the other side."

The book truly reflects her personality and character and I really enjoyed reading it. I have already learned a lot of these life lessons in the few years since graduation. I don't think reading this book before hand would have saved me those experiences, and I don't think I'd want it to. Experience is the best teacher after all. But it was nice to see I seem to be heading along the right track!

I give it 4 out of 5 stars!

Anybody Out There? by Marian Keyes

This is the first Marian Keye's novel I've read. Apparently this she writes a series of novels about the Walsh sisters. This one is focused on Anna. Anna lives in New York and has a PR job working for Candy Grrl cosmetics. The story starts out with Anna back in Ireland being taken care of by her Mum. Anna is bruised and cut up and no one ever really tells you why or how this happened.

But Anna is anxious to get back to her life in New York. She flies back and returns to her empty neglected apartment and desperately tries to get in contact with her husband Aiden. She emails him everyday, catches glimpses of him on her way to work, and goes to great lengths to find out what is going on with him.

This book has lots of twists and turns. A lot of other people have written that it is sad, but I had a different perspective that it was just peering into her life.

I enjoyed the main plot line and the sub-plots were very good too. It did take me a month to read it though. Even though it was a thick book at 464 pages, I would say this indicates somewhat my level of interest in the book. (Some of those Twilight books I breezed through in days!) I liked this book, but I didn't love it.

I would give it 3.5 out of 5 stars.

It was good, but I don't think it generated enough interest in me to read her other books.