Recent Reads: A Felon and two romances

So I've read a few books lately that I haven't talked about, and I'm starting to forget what I think about them.  I've decided to just lump them all together into one post, even though I don't like to not give every book it's own review. I'm pretty sure if I don't get something posted I won't post at all!

Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison by Piper Kerman is yet another memoir style book where the author spends a certain amount of time doing something unusual. In this case, the author is in prison for a decades old crime related to drugs.  She chooses to turn her experience into a book about prison life, which is good for her, and is somewhat interesting for the reader. She manages to keep it from being all about gossip and it's not overly condescending towards her fellow inmates who are all less educated than Kerman and from a lower economic background. She talks about how different prisons are completely different in terms of how they treat prisoners and what things are available at different places, for example, at one prison they did not even have underwear for her.  It's a quick and easy book to read, but I found Kerman to be annoying and to maintain the attitude that she was somehow better than everyone else, that she didn't belong there. (Despite never denying her guilt.) I picked this one up based on a review at Tina Says...

Orange is the New Black
Piper Kerman
Spiegel & Krau
2010
320 pages
Source: library

What Happens in London by Julie London. If you recall, I just read Ten Things I Love About You (review here) and enjoyed it, but thought that I should have read this one first. So I read it, and LOVED it. This has a nice slow falling in love, with no big drama at all in the first 9/10ths of the book.  Just as I was thinking that this was a perfect romance- all about the couple, no silly outside plot to distract, etc, outside plot happened. There wasn't much hint that it would end the way it did, so I was taken by surprise, but I still ended up loving the book. Harry is just about perfect in a refreshing way and it perfectly sets up for Seb's story in Ten Things.

What Happens in London
Julia Quinn
Avon
2009
384 pages
Source: Bought it last year

Shut Up and Kiss Me by Christie Craig made my TBR list due to this review at The Good, The Bad and the Unread.  I started it right before I had the baby, and then this was the book I had with me when she was readmitted to the hospital. I spent much of that day with only what I had with me in my purse and was able to finish this one up. The lure of humor is what made me pick it up, but in practice I found the elements that were supposed to be funny to be too slapstick for me. Fortunately, these things were usually things that happened to characters other than the hero and heroine. I did enjoy the interactions between Shala and Sky, but didn't really buy the romance between them- it happened way too fast and I found the "soul mate" aspect a little too woowoo.  So, good story, and great for an afternoon sitting around the hospital, but not one that makes me want to read another by this author.

Shut up and Kiss Me
Christie Craig
Lovespell 
2010
320 pages
Source: library






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