A Girl Named Zippy: Growing Up Small in Mooreland, Indiana, by Haven Kimmel (2002)
I can hardly conceive of a more unpromising title for a memoir. Comments on the back cover added to my feelings of dread: "sleepy little hamlet," "small-town America," "people helped their neighbors," and so on. I was loathe to even look at the cover, let alone attempt to read the book, but I was trapped into it by a nice person whose feelings must not be hurt, and so I promised myself I would only have to read 20 pages of small-town crap and then I could read the book club questions at the back so I could make convincingly thoughtful remarks if asked my opinion.
And of course I loved the book. LOVED it. If, in general, a person were to wax nostalgic about his/her small town experience, I would be bored to the point of slipping quietly under my chair. If I had to hear further anecdotes regarding that person's precocious childhood, I wouldn't be responsible for my actions. Cutesy nickname? Deduct ten more points. And yet, here we have our precocious-child heroine, nicknamed Zippy, telling stories of her small-town childhood, and I was riveted. I can't explain it, I can only urge you to put a brown-paper wrapping over the cover and give the book a try.
Motherhood & Hollywood, by Patricia Heaton (2002)
Worth reading if you like Patricia Heaton (one of the stars of the TV show Everybody Loves Raymond). There are many, many people who don't realize they're making cliched remarks/jokes and I'm sure we all do it from time to time, and it is better to be merciful when, for example, people write overly colloquially (e.g., actually writing out "Aaaanyway") or say "Don't get me wrong." And if someone goes on and on and ON about her various restaurant jobs--well, it is best to keep in mind that we all ramble from time to time. It is possible to put up with a friend who rambles if she is also charming, and such is the case here. Patricia Heaton is at her best when she tells us about her marriage ("to the wrong person"), Hollywood dating, and her cosmetic surgery, and she is at her worst when she tells hilarious anecdotes about that time she was fired from some restaurant, or when she finds the opportunity to defend herself against critics, or when she starts dripping about the preciousness of life/family/friends. Overall she is an appealing person with some interesting stories to tell, and as celebrity autobiographies go, this was a pretty good one.
The Last Girls, by Lee Smith (2002)
This is a book in "four friends reunite" category. There is much reflecting on the past.
This sort of book can be fraught with problems: overly separated/stereotyped characters, overly eventful life stories, overly sappy assumptions about eternal friendship, etc. On the other hand, this sort of book can be full of interesting plotlines and conflicts. If you like "four friends" fiction, this is a good one to read. I had trouble remembering which one was Courtney and which one was Catherine, and I didn't care AT ALL about the "the rest of the girls" bio section at the end, and I thought the poetry was laughably bad--but I could read the whole book with sustained interest and hardly any wincing. The quality of writing was better than most, and the loose ends, while irritating, didn't spoil it. If this review sounds tepid, it's because as I think back over the storylines, I feel less satisfied than I did while reading. Suddenly I'm wondering what was with Harriet and her little spells. I thought she was going to have a brain tumor or something, but it didn't turn out to be anything. And I'm wondering what happens with Hawk. And what about Catherine's illness?