{"id":12,"date":"2010-10-10T20:57:55","date_gmt":"2010-10-10T20:57:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/katerivet.wordpress.com\/?p=12"},"modified":"2015-07-27T20:39:51","modified_gmt":"2015-07-28T01:39:51","slug":"taking-a-break-to-read","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/?p=12","title":{"rendered":"Taking a break to read"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve been so busy writing lately that I’ve had a stack of books lying by my bed I’ve neglected to even crack open.\u00a0 I’m happy to say that over the past week or so, I’ve managed to read three books, and I absolutely loved them all!\u00a0 I thought I would take a minute and write about each one just a little.<\/p>\n

Book #1: Mini-Shopaholic<\/a> by Sophie Kinsella<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

This was the first book I managed to start and finish out of the three, and I absolutely loved it.\u00a0 I’m a big fan of Sophie Kinsella, and own all but one or two of her books, so as soon as this was released, I ran out and picked up my copy.\u00a0 I loved all of the Shopaholic books (and the movie, which I hear might place me somewhat in the minority), so I was glad to be able to see what Becky and Luke were up to.\u00a0 To recap shortly: the last Shopaholic book ended with Becky and Luke having their own baby, Minnie Brandon.\u00a0 They had tried to buy a house, but the deal fell through; instead, they moved in with Becky’s parents until they could get on their feet again.\u00a0 Mini-Shopaholic picks up two years later.\u00a0 Becky’s still working for The Look part-time, and Luke’s still running Brandon Communications; he’s still trying to settle everything from the Arcodas disaster.\u00a0 They’ve had the deals fall through on more than just a few houses now, and are still trying hard to move out of Becky’s parents’ place.\u00a0 We get to follow Becky in this book as she attempts to throw Luke a huge birthday party, and she tries to tame Minnie’s shopaholic habit that she’s picked up from none other than Becky herself, all while Luke tries to keep everything in check as the banks start to have failure issues.\u00a0 It’s a great book, and the ending was really nice.\u00a0 I don’t know if Ms. Kinsella plans to write any more Shopaholic books, but I’d love to read another.<\/p>\n

Book #2: Sugar and Spice<\/a> by Lauren Conrad<\/a><\/p>\n

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Full disclosure: I love reality television.\u00a0 I watched Lauren Conrad faithfully on Laguna Beach and cheered for her against Kristin Cavallari, then I watched her on The Hills for a season or two before the show started to bore me (and before Spencer and Heidi got as crazy as they became).\u00a0 I actually met Lauren Conrad a few years ago when she was in town promoting her clothing lines, and she was a total sweetheart.\u00a0 As soon as I heard about her first book, LA Candy, I had to go get it.\u00a0 I was utterly surprised at how good it was!\u00a0 I didn’t think much of it, because I never saw Lauren as an author, but she definitely has a great story she’s been telling.\u00a0 I thought the same of the second book, Sweet Little Lies.\u00a0 Everybody seems to say that you should write what you know, and Lauren definitely knows a lot about how reality television works.\u00a0 So, her third book, Sugar and Spice, picks up where Sweet Little Lies leaves off.\u00a0 The heroine of our story, Jane Roberts, is recovering from her second break-up with her boyfriend Jesse, and she’s now torn between three guys — Jesse, his former roommate Braden, and a former high school boyfriend, Caleb.\u00a0 Jane’s got all of this drama in addition to one of her LA Candy costars, Madison, on her tail trying to ruin her and make herself the star of the series.\u00a0 Jane’s best friend Scarlett is also stuck with some serious thinking to do when she has to decide between staying at USC or transferring to any of the other colleges she’s secretly been applying to, all while trying to keep her first serious relationship afloat despite the LA Candy producers seemingly trying to ruin it all.\u00a0 It’s a good conclusion to the series, and I was surprised to find out some of the twists relating to Madison, then later, Jane.\u00a0 It’s definitely worth a read, and I really did like this series in general.<\/p>\n

Book #3: Priceless<\/a> by Nicole Richie<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Priceless\"<\/p>\n

Yes, I loved Nicole on The Simple Life with Paris Hilton.\u00a0 Yes, I own Seasons 1 and 2 on DVD.\u00a0 Yes, I was on Team Nicole during her feud with Paris.\u00a0 And yes, I own her first book, The Truth About Diamonds.\u00a0 I think Nicole has a great voice that shines through her books.\u00a0 I really enjoyed hearing the story of Chloe Parker, and all her struggles and triumphs throughout that novel.\u00a0 I have reread it at least two or three times, and I like it more with each read.\u00a0 I had actually forgotten that this had come out, and I was lucky enough to stumble upon it at Barnes and Noble the other day while I was picking up Sugar and Spice.\u00a0 I sat down and read it this morning (I’m a quick reader), and I loved the tale.\u00a0 This book tells the story of Charlotte Williams, a girl whose father spares no expense on his princess.\u00a0 Her mother was killed in a car accident when she was just seven, and she was raised by a nanny for a few years named Miss Millie.\u00a0 The other staff of the house, Davis and Greta, also helped to raise this pampered girl.\u00a0 She’s just returned from a year in Sorbonne — she’d been studying at Yale before she had a drunken incident which involved her torching the school’s political science building as revenge against an ex-boyfriend. \u00a0Things seem to be back to normal, but that changes rapidly — her father is arrested for securities fraud, and her family is now under investigation by the FBI and the SEC, as well as the police.\u00a0 Charlotte’s apartment that she grew up in is seized, so she chooses to head to New Orleans and find Miss Millie, who has offered for her to come stay.\u00a0 There are a few problems she encounters on the way — all of the money her late mother left her is frozen by the government although it is entirely separate from her father’s, and she suddenly has a psycopathic stalker threatening to kill her — but it’s her new friends, Kat and Jackson, and her beautiful singing voice that provide her with a bright spot on the horizon.\u00a0 It’s a great story from start to finish, and I highly recommend it.<\/p>\n

Well, there you go!\u00a0 Three books that I’ve read, and they’re all worth borrowing, if not buying.\u00a0 I do love reading as well as writing, and it’s been very fun to delve into other authors’ works for a change.\u00a0 Not that I don’t love my books — because I do! — but it’s always great to have a slight vacation, isn’t it?<\/p>\n

Until next time,
\nKate<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve been so busy writing lately that I’ve had a stack of books lying by my bed I’ve neglected to even crack open.\u00a0 I’m happy to say that over the past week or so, I’ve managed to read three books, and I absolutely loved them all!\u00a0 I thought I would take a minute and write […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kateblog"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6N5R7-c","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":315,"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12\/revisions\/315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/katerivet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}