In Samantha’s Mailbox:
Title: Sparkle
Author: Cara Leyba
Received: Via CLP Blog Tours
Synopsis: As women, we have become professional self-critics. We’ve become so convinced by society that we need to attain a level of perfection that just isn’t real. Whether it’s trying to get skinnier, look younger, get that promotion, please our parents, get fuller lips or rid ourselves of cellulite — we’re on a never-ending mission to change and it always winds up making us feel like crap. Instead, why not focus on all the fabulous qualities we already possess? There is so much to celebrate when we look at all our accomplishments. In this straight-up girlfriend’s guide, lifestylist and wellness coach Cara Alwill Leyba encourages women to discover what makes them sparkle so that they can design the lives they desire and deserve. So raise your glass and toast yourself. You’re about to start shimmering, shining and dazzling every day! Because isn’t everything better when it sparkles?
Title: Sad Desk Salad
Author: Jessica Grose
Received: From HarperCollins
Synopsis: As a writer for Chick Habit, an increasingly popular women’s website, Alex Lyons gets paid to be a bitch. She’s churning out several posts a day, and she saves her juiciest ones for blog prime time, when working women eat their sad desk salads in their offices. Alex tells herself she’s fulfilling her dream of being a professional writer; so what if it means being glued to her couch and her laptop from six a.m. to six p.m., scouring the web in search of the next big celebrity scandal? Since Chick Habit’s parent company keeps close tabs on page views, Alex knows her job is always at risk.
So when an anonymous tipster sends her the year’s most salacious story—a politico’s squeaky-clean Ivy League daughter caught in a very R-rated activity—it’s a no-brainer. But is Alex really willing to ruin the girl’s life by igniting the next Internet feeding frenzy? And what she doesn’t yet realize is how this big scoop is about to send her own life spiraling out of control.
Title: A Very Accidental Love Story
Author: Claudia Carroll
Received: From Avon Books, Unsolicited
Synopsis: Eloise Elliot is one of the youngest newspaper editors in the country. Respected and revered by her peers, she’s at the top of her game.
But, on the eve of her thirtieth birthday, finding herself surrounded by some pathetic looking balloons and mangy sandwiches in The Daily Post’s conference room, Eloise is hit but a long sharp pang of loneliness.
Suddenly, and with dazzling clarity, she realises what she wants to make her life more complete. A baby.
One successful trip to the sperm bank and almost three years later and she is the adoring mother of a gorgeous little girl, Lily. Juggling a high-powered job with motherhood is not easy and when she finds herself without childcare she sends an SOS to her sister Helen. Yet it’s when Lily starts asking about her ‘daddy’ that Eloise really starts to panic. What will she tell her?
In Sara’s Mailbox:
Title: The Girl, the Gold Tooth and Everything
Author: Francine LaSala
Received: Francine LaSala
Synopsis: Mina Clark is losing her mind—or maybe it’s already gone. She isn’t quite sure. Feeling displaced in her over-priced McMansion-dotted suburban world, she is grappling not only with deep debt, a mostly absent husband, and her playground-terrorizer 3-year old Emma, but also with a significant amnesia she can’t shake—a “temporary” condition now going on several years, brought on by a traumatic event she cannot remember, and which everyone around her feels is best forgotten. A routine trip to the dentist changes everything for Mina, and suddenly she’s not sure if what’s happening is real, of if she’s just now fully losing her mind… especially when she realizes the only person she thought she could trust is the one she fears the most.
This latest novel by Francine LaSala (Rita Hayworth’s Shoes) is a fast-paced, richly layered, and darkly humorous satire filled with quirky characters and unforgettable moments of humanity.
