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Confessions of a Call Center Gal by Lisa Lim

Madison Lee has graduated from college and is ready to take on the real world…the real world that comes with a ten percent unemployment rate that is only going up. Unable to nab her dream job in print media, Madison settles for the only paying job she can find- a service rep at a call center in Pocatello, Idaho. She gets to work with her BFF all while staring down the delectable foreigner Mika Harket, another co-worker who may be the sexiest man alive. While the phones calls can range from thankful, hilarious, to downright rude (a caller insisting she address him by Dr.) Maddy learns through many trials and tribulations the humbling world of working in a call center.
I had a lot of fun reading Confessions of a Call Center Gal, the debut from Lisa Lim. While I have never worked in a call center, I have held many customer service jobs, and this book reminded me why I hold my tongue when speaking to a service rep. They are just regular people like myself, trying to make a living. Some enjoy working at the call center, others are doing it just to scrape by. Some are young guns trying to make it to the top, others are older women who like to crochet booties for their grandkids on their breaks. This book was a real eye opener to a job that many people either take for granted or look down upon, and I’m glad Lim offered me a copy to read. Maddy and her slew of friends are funny and down to earth. The only thing that lacked for me was the relationship between Maddy and Mika. I really just didn’t get it. I felt it was really awkward and strained the whole time, but other than that, super funny book, great writing from Lim and I would definitely recommend this to chick lit fans. Oh- and my little blog makes a cameo in the eBooks. How fun is that? 
[Rating: 4]

GIVEAWAY: Confessions of a Call Center Gal by Lisa Lim

Madison Lee is a fresh college grad, ready to take on the world of print media. But she has zero luck landing a job. Unemployment is at ten percent and on the rise. Desperate and left with no other options, she accepts a position as a service rep at a call center in Pocatello, Idaho. At the Lightning Speed call center in Spudsville, Maddy plunges into the wild and dysfunctional world of customer service where Sales is prided over Service and an eight hour shift is equivalent to eight hours of callers bashing her over the phone. Oh sure, the calls are bad. But Maddy manages to find humor on the phone and off the phone. And with all the salacious drama behind the calls, there is never a dull moment at the Lightning Speed call center.
Lately . . . Maddy has been pining for her smolderingly gorgeous co-worker Mika Harket. Now things are heating up on the phone–and elsewhere. Don’t hang up on this novel. Working at a call center has never been this garish . . . or this delightful.
I have two copies of Confessions of a Call Center Gal by Lisa Lim for giveaway- one paperback and one eCopy. To enter, please leave a comment below letting me know why you want to win, and please include if you would prefer paperback or eBook. Winners will be chosen Thursday, July 7. Thank you to Lisa Lim for sponsoring this giveaway!

In My Mailbox: Week of May 22

In My Mailbox: Week of May 22, 2011

Title: Love and Freedom
Author: Sue Moorcroft
Received: From Choc Lit
Synopsis: New start, new love. That’s what Honor Sontag needs after her life falls apart, leaving her reputation in tatters and her head all over the place. So she flees her native America and heads for Brighton, England. Honor’s hoping for a much-deserved break and the chance to find the mother who abandoned her as a baby. What she gets is an entanglement with a mysterious male whose family seems to have a finger in every pot in town. Martyn Mayfair has sworn off women with strings attached, but is irresistibly drawn to Honor, the American who keeps popping up in his life. All he wants is an uncomplicated relationship built on honesty, but Honor’s past threatens to undermine everything. When secrets about her mother start to spill out …Honor has to make an agonising choice. Will she live up to her dutiful name and please others? Or will she choose freedom? From the best selling author of Starting Over, this novel has great charm and a cast of unforgettable characters.

Title: Confessions of a Call Center Girl
Author: Lisa Lim
Received: From Lisa Lim
Synopsis: Madison Lee is a fresh college grad, ready to take on the world of print media. But she has zero luck landing a job. Unemployment is at ten percent and on the rise. Desperate and left with no other options, she accepts a position as a service rep at a call center in Pocatello, Idaho. At the Lightning Speed call center in Spudsville, Maddy plunges into the wild and dysfunctional world of customer service where Sales is prided over Service and an eight hour shift is equivalent to eight hours of callers bashing her over the phone. Oh sure, the calls are bad. But Maddy manages to find humor on the phone and off the phone. And with all the salacious drama behind the calls, there is never a dull moment at the Lightning Speed call center.
Lately . . . Maddy has been pining for her smolderingly gorgeous co-worker Mika Harket. Now things are heating up on the phone–and elsewhere. Don’t hang up on this novel. Working at a call center has never been this garish . . . or this delightful.

Title: The Summer We Came to Life
Author: Deborah Cloyed
Received: From Eric @ Planned Television Arts
Synopsis: Every summer, Samantha Wheland joins her childhood friends – Isabel, Kendra and Mina – on a vacation somewhere exotic and fabulous. This year, it’s a beach house in Honduras, but for the first time, their clan is not complete. Mina lost her battle against cancer six months prior, and the friends she left behind are still struggling to find a way to move on without her. Before the trip ends, the bonds of friendship with her living friends, the older generation’s stories of love and loss, and Samantha’s glimpse into a world far removed from the one in which she belongs will convince her to trust her heart.

Title: One Bird’s Choice
Author: Iain Reid
Received: From a friend
Synopsis: Meet Iain Reid: an overeducated, underemployed twenty-something, living in the big city in a bug-filled basement apartment and struggling to make ends meet. When Iain lands a job at a radio station near his childhood home, he decides to take it. But the work is only part time, so he is forced to move back in with his lovable but eccentric parents on their hobby farm. What starts out as a temporary arrangement turns into a year-long extended stay, in which Iain finds himself fighting with the farm fowl, taking fashion advice from the elderly, fattening up on a gluttonous fare of home-cooked food, and ultimately easing (perhaps a little too comfortably) into the semi-retired, rural lifestyle. A hilarious and heartwarming comic memoir about food, family, and finally growing up, One Bird’s Choice marks the arrival of a funny, original, and fresh new voice.