Bossypants by Tina Fey

Why is this book called Bossypants? One, because the name Two and a Half Men was already taken. And two, because ever since I became an executive producer of 30 Rock, people have asked me, "Is it hard for you, being the boss?" and "Is it uncomfortable for you to be the person in charge?" You know, in that same way they say, "Gosh, Mr. Trump, is it awkward for you to be the boss of all these people?" I can't answer for Mr. Trump, but in my case it is not. I've learned a lot over the past ten years about what it means to be the boss of people. In most cases being a good boss means hiring talented people and then getting out of their way. In other cases, to get the best work out of people you may have to pretend you are not their boss and let them treat someone else like the boss, and then that person whispers to you behind a fake wall and you tell them what to tell the first person. Contrary to what I believed as a little girl, being the boss almost never involves marching around, waving your arms, and chanting, "I am the boss! I am the boss!"

-Bossypants 

So I decided I needed to take a bit of a breather from Little Dorrit, which I hate to admit is fairly slow going so far. I'm nearly halfway through, and I'm hoping things will kick into high gear soon. In the weeks I've been reading it, a dozen books from various sources have piled up on my shelf, and I thought it might be better to take a break and read a couple of those. Thus, Bossypants, a birthday present from my most excellent brother.

I've loved (and identified with) Tina Fey since she first came into the spotlight as co-anchor of Weekend Update. I always have solidarity with ladies who wear glasses, but beyond that she seemed both funny and incisive, which is about the best you can ask for in a comedian. Also, she went to my alma mater, which means I was lucky enough to see her perform on stage with a touring company of Second City during my time there.

All of this led me to believe that I would be a great fan of Bossypants, and I was absolutely right. Tina (I feel like I can call her Tina, right?) starts with a self-deprecating look at her nerdy childhood, which is always a good start in my book. She covers everything from her college years* to her time running 30 Rock, with enough room in between to share the story of a honeymoon cruise gone wrong and the travails of working at the YMCA. Tina has that enviable talent of a great writer to take a fairly mundane situation and make it both funny and engrossing--you just want her to tell you about everything. 

It's a very quick read--ideal for bringing along on a plane trip or to the beach if you don't mind risking looking a bit crazy while stifling laughter in public. I'm quite pleased to have a copy, as I can definitely see both rereading it and lending it out in the future.

Up next: I am quite behind in blog posts, so I've already finished Spoiled by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan.

*I was pleased when she took a line to explain a bit of the terminology we use at Mr. Jefferson's University. It's absolutely pretentious of us and I love it so.Wahoowa!

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

A letter. For me. That was something of an event. The crisp-cornered envelope, puffed up with its thickly folded contents, was addressed in a hand that must have given the postman a certain amount of trouble. Although the style of the writing was old-fashioned, with its heavily embellished capitals and curly flourishes, my first impression was that it had been written by a child. The letters seemed untrained. Their uneven strokes either faded into nothing or were heavily etched into the paper. There was no sense of flow in the letters that spelled out my name. Each had been undertaken separately--M A R G A R E T L E A--as a new and daunting enterprise. But I knew no children. That is when I thought, It is the hand of an invalid.

It gave me a queer feeling. Yesterday or the day before, while I had been going about my business, quietly and in private, some unknown person--some stranger--had gone to the trouble of marking my name onto this envelope. Who was it who had had his mind's eye on me while I hadn't suspected a thing?

-The Thirteenth Tale 

Margaret Lea, the heroine of The Thirteenth Tale, receives a mysterious letter. The sender, to Margaret's surprise, is one of England's most beloved authors: the reclusive Vida Winter. Vida has long prided herself on obfuscating her past in interviews, using her gifts as a novelist to invent her own history, each version more colorful than the last. Finally she is ready to tell her true story, and she's plucked Margaret from obscurity to be her biographer.

Margaret is reluctant at first. She's never even read a book by Vida Winter, for a start--she's not one for contemporary fiction. And while she has written some biographical accounts, they weren't about living people. She doesn't have much use for living people in general, really. She spends her days in her father's antiquarian bookshop, happily surrounded by books. But she overcomes her reservations and makes the trip to Yorkshire, then sets to sharpening her pencils. Vida's story awaits her.

Everyone has a story, Vida says, and hers is a doozy.  It's every bit as Gothic as the 19th century novels Margaret holds so dear--there's incest, and illegitimate children, and plenty of intrigue. Oh, and murder--of course there's murder. Margaret finds herself more and more pulled into the story, especially when it becomes apparent that even in Vida's most honest retelling, there's much that's being left unsaid.

The Thirteenth Tale is a great, absorbing read. I read the bulk of it traveling to and from Chicago recently, and I couldn't have asked for a better book to pass the time. In fact, I finished slightly before the end of the flight, so I lingered over the Reader's Guide, which I often pass over. I quite enjoyed the interview with Diane Setterfield, whom I identified with--especially when she talked about the panicky sensation one can get if one needs a book and doesn't have it at the ready. A terrible problem, to be sure, though one I'm unlikely to have in the near future, given the number of unread books currently piling up in my apartment.

Up next: What's better in the summertime than a nice, fat Dickens novel? I'm about 80 pages into Little Dorrit--that is to say, a little less than a tenth of the way through. Excellent.

Masquerade by Melissa de la Cruz

 

"Aduivo Amicus Specialis. Nihilum cello. Meus victus est tui manus." I come to you for aid as a secret, special friend. I have nothing to hide. My life is in your hands.

He looked into her eyes with an icy stare that could only belong to Schuyler's kind, and her words faded into silence.

"Dormio," he ordered, and with a wave of his hand, she felt the darkness come upon her as she fainted.

-Masquerade

If you were to pick a city a vampire might haunt, Venice would have to be among your top prospects. So it comes as no surprise that that's where we find Schuyler Van Alen at the outset of Masquerade, the second Blue Bloods book by Melissa de la Cruz. Schuyler has come to Venice in search of her grandfather, a man whom she has never met. Nevertheless, he's her last hope to learn more about the Silver Bloods, the corrupted vampires believed to be behind a recent string of attacks in New York.

It's gotten dangerous out there for the Blue Bloods, and things are particularly difficult for Schuyler and her friend Bliss. Both girls have been dealing with mysterious blackouts--and things only get more complicated when they consider taking their first human blood...

Okay, it can sound a little silly at times. But once you get wrapped up in the Blue Bloods world, Masquerade becomes a pretty good pageturner. I certainly read it quite quickly, and I'm sure I'll be getting to the third one before long. 

Up next: I've already finished The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield, and I'm looking forward to coming back and writing about it.