Anthropology of the Single White Female

Latest Reads: Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin

Currently Reading: Eat, Pray, Love  Melissa Gilbert (Suck it- I want to know what the fuss is about.)

Recent Musical Find: Mumford & Sons

My Take on Anthropology of American Girl by Hilary Thayer Hamann:

I actually finished Anthropology of American Girl about a month ago, but have been putting off posting an entry about it. The story centers around a young girl, Eveline, going through the transition from late teens to young adult in the early 80s. You meet her as a shy, clever, and completely underrated Long Island high-schooler with divorced middle class parents and a boyfriend whose friends don't like her. She's artistic and smart, but unsure of everything life has dealt her including the death of her best friend's mother, who also serves as her second mother and her own parents divorce.

The first part of the novel takes Evie through high school and introduces the reader to her friends, which are quite numerous for such a simple girl, and her family, which are actually rarely ever mentioned again after graduation. This was my favorite part of the book because Hamann does an extraordinary job of presenting life as an almost adult where you're free of bills and most responsibility, but on the verve of becoming aware of the wide world beyond (at least Evie does). The phrase you don't realize happened until it's past; childhood's end so to say.

Graduation, as it often does, signals the end of the "freedom" era and the beginning of the "free love" era. Evie leaves Jack, her high school love and rebel extraordinaire and begins dating Harrison Rourke, her one true love and former drama student teacher. For how scandalous that sounds, Hamann handles the situation like the most natural thing (which is how Evie and Rourke's relationship is always presented throughout the book and after all--it's not technically illegal by then).

After a summer love affair, complete with cohabitation, Evie moves to Manhattan to attend NYU as an art history major. Note: she's studying art, not making it. And her and Rourke end their unspoken commitment since he's going across country anyway. While in New York, Evie essentially looses herself for 3-4 years in friends, pseudo-friends, her own heartbreak and Mark, Mr. Rich-But-Wrong-For-So-Many-Reasons. Throughout these years you find yourself wondering why she doesn't just walk away (from Mark and/or New York), but without Rourke she hesitates to do or not to do anything. Instead she just lets life come at her, sometimes in lolling dulls or like a fast train. As Evie struggles to find her way, Rourke is rarely in sight, but always present through friends of friends or with the occasional chance meeting.

I admire Hamann's ending because while she ends it fairly how you want her to, she doesn't do so without giving you a few kicks for good measure which is sort of how life plays it most times as well.

Fair warning: the page count is close to 600 and I'm not sure that they're all absolutely necessary, but they are all absolutely good and well written. The journey is worth it, but I wouldn't recommend stretching the novel out over a long period--too many characters and events packed into these 6 years of Evie's life.

Hamann gets the coveted 5 out of 5 Cetoria's. (Congrats Hamann!)

-Sincerely Cetoria

Big Ass in the Snowpocalypse of 2011

With the snowpocalypse threatening to keep me indefinitely in South Georgia, I find myself doing anything to avoid spending time with my family. And so, another blog post is here:  


Latest reads: Bright Lights, Big Ass by Jen Lancaster, Last Sacrifice by Richelle Mead


Latest musical discovery: The Decemberists--if you're into folk music with an Irish slant, you're probably into them. Check out them out and try and prove me wrong. 


Currently reading: The Society of S by Susan Hubbard

Here's my take on Bright Lights, Big Ass : A Self-Indulgent, Surly, Ex-Sorority Girl's Guide to Why it Often Sucks in the City, or Who are These Idiots and Why Do They All Live Next Door to Me?  by Jen Lancaster. (I know, she went all Fiona Apple with the insanely long title. All for the comedy, I suppose.) 


I though the memoir was nicely done. She's absolutely one of the funniest ladies around and proves it in every chapter, email expert, and open letter from cover to cover. In this book, which is the sequel to Bitter is the New Black (aka: Bitter is the New Black: Confessions of a Condescending, Egomaniacal, Self-Centered Smartass,Or, Why You Should Never Carry A Prada Bag to the Unemployment Office--hey, once you've got a gimmick you gotta stick with it), Lancaster opens up about her personal opinions/phobias/general ticks to her audience more which makes, for the most part, good reading. Her chapter on the challenges of maintaining modesty at a spa was beyond funny. Who would have thought a confident, loud mouthed, fat lady can't stand the thought of public nudity (hers or anyone else's)? 


Where I thought the book sort of lacked meat (actually story, less fluffy smart-ass jokes) was the storyline. Overall, the book is about Lancaster's experiences living in the big city, aka Chicago. And while she definitely covers that, I felt myself laughing at her wise cracks, more than reading a story at times. This critique is probably because I read Bitter is the New Black, which chronicles her two year struggle of unemployment after being laid off from a fabulous (read: really good paying) dot-com job, first and it has much more defined timeline. (It's hilarious if you're into a smart woman making funny jokes about learning to live on very little income.) 


In short, for this effort I give Ms. Lancaster 4 our of 5 Cetoria's because she hit the mark on what she was trying to do--write a hilarious book about living in the big city on a little budget. 


Ms. Lancaster also has a popular blog: http://www.jennsylvania.com/  if you're interested.  


Sincerely, 
Cetoria

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

          A friend passed this novel along to me with a high recommendation. I took her advice and found her advice fairly well founded. Stockett presents Jackson, Mississippi in the 1960s from three main character’s perspectives: two African-American maids, Aibileen and Minny, and one white recent college graduate just returned home, Skeeter.

The novel plot is pretty straight forward and easy to follow, but often heart-breaking especially in the second half when Skeeter organizes the maids, “the help”, and compiles their stories for national publication.

What I found most interesting about the novel was Stockett’s ability to create three complex protagonists that never seem to over power one another even though each has her own crisis she is dealing with.

I have passed it along to another friend who also thoroughly enjoyed it so that’s three votes in its favor. Oh, and it’s also a certified best seller.

I give it 3.5 out of 5 supernovae. This meaning, it’s good, but not amazingly life changing. 

The Wait is Over: Come One, Come All!

            For various and uncomplicated reasons I’m finally giving into the peer pressure and starting a blog of my own and I want to invite you all to take this strange, but hopefully wonderful, journey with me.

            When I first thought of starting a blog, I quickly dismissed the idea because I couldn’t imagine what anyone would really want to hear me “talk” about. I was coming up with a blank for subject matter. Don’t get me wrong, I love to talk, and write, but I don’t think people surfing the web genuinely wish to hear about the mundane oddities of my life.  So, I thought and thought off and on when I probably should have been doing something more productive and eventually had an idea I considered worth keeping.

So, without further ado, this blog is going to be my sounding board for what I’m currently reading (does the title make sense now?) In essence, my own version of the New York Times Book Review except, you know, without the prestige or paychecks so don’t set your standard too high. I’ll give my reading recommendations and you can give me (and everyone else) yours. Sound exciting, doesn’t it?

Disclaimer: I’m not promising I won’t branch out into other topics of my personal interest such as sharing an intriguing story or voicing an opinion so all you die hard book reviewers out there can just calm down if/when this happens.

In general, blogs have always sort of felt like an usual way to air your opinions, but everyone and their sister seems to be doing it these days so there’s got to be something to it, right? And then it hit me: who says anyone is ever going to read this? Well, if I’m going to do this I figure I need some kind of a game plan (even if I choose to completely abandon it later--because I’m Cetoria and I do what I want). Hopefully, someone besides me enjoys this endeavor, but there’s really no guarantee that’s going to happen so here goes nothing. Hope to see back soon!

-Sincerely Cetoria