Relishing Research

Dear Readers,

Today is a day where I feel too chicken to really write the person who's the subject of this entry directly.  See, I'm trying to do a little bit of research to help me along with my NaNoWriMo book, and I realized that I have to re-read a book I used to own--and purged from my own collection because I didn't care for it all that much.

Say what?

Yep, my own book seems to be veering toward the chick lit category, which I don't particularly mind.  I thoroughly enjoy me some good chick lit.  As I near the end of writing the first draft, I wanted to read a bunch of chick lit so that when it comes time to start the editing process, I'll have a better handle on what does and does not constitute a good chick lit book.

Sadly for me, one book that I thought of while I've been writing my own is Wedding Season by Darcy Cosper.  I got this when it first came out, based on a recommendation by Daily Candy.  It's the tale of a woman who's stuck going to 17 weddings in six months.  She and her boyfriend don't ever want to get married, but all these weddings have her reexamining her choices.

I remember being highly disappointed with this book--to me it wasn't "a witty, wicked comedy of manners in the satirical tradition of Jane Austen and Evelyn Waugh" as described on the book cover.  But, in my novel, I'm dealing with a large series of events, so I wanted to take another look at Cosper's book to see once more how she handled it, and figure out what exactly I don't like about her book so that I can fix my own.  Color me unthrilled (but thankful that the library had a copy).

Luckily, I have a stack of other chick lit that should keep me occupied--two or three Jennifer Weiners, and a couple of other random ones I pulled off the library shelf.  I hope to cram in some Austen and Bronte too, as well as reread a few that are on my own shelves.  If you've got some favorite chick lit books, let me know.  I want to expose myself to as much as possible.

Your pal,
Jill