Today I read ‘Body Shots: Hollywood and the Culture of Eating Disorders’ by Emily Fox-Kales. This book explains in plain English (i.e. no endless strings of academic jargon) the ways in which Hollywood movies both reflect and encourage the cultural attitudes and thought processes that cause eating disorders. The author is both a professor and a…[Read more]

Hello hello! I just finished ‘Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?’ by Mindy Kaling. Overall it was pretty good, although individual essays ranged from hilarious to totally boring and annoying. I liked it as much as I liked Bossypants, although I think Bp has a much wider audience. If (like me)you fall into Mindy Kaling’s target audience of ‘smart,…[Read more]

I just finished reading ‘Dies the Fire’ by S.M. Stirling and it was AWESOME! It’s the first book in a series, but it’s a self-contained story; it doesn’t end on a cliffhanger or anything. One day out of the blue, there’s a flash of white light and everything mechanical stops working all at once. Not only that, but guns and steam engines don’t work…[Read more]

Okay, so I was going to read that Cleopatra biography, but then I got ‘Monstrous Regiment’ by Terry Pratchett in the mail and had to read it first.

I just finished it today and I LOVED it! I’m making my way through the Discworld books all willynilly, but out of the ones I’ve read so far I think this is my favorite. It was hilarious and somehow…[Read more]

Map of Ireland by Stephanie Grant is set in Boston in the 1970’s and deals with coming out and race issues from the perspective of a teenage girl. I watched The Weather Underground documentary not too long ago which turned out to be great historical context for this book.