So behind, but who cares?

So my plan to blog about every single book I read this year has clearly, as my mother's former coworker would say, fallen by the waistline. Some books, like Junot Diaz's The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, were hard to write about due to their sheer awesomeness. How do you write about such an amazing book? It has catapulted onto my list of all-time favorites, and I know I'll come back to it again and again. Some books, on the other hand, are guilty pleasures that I really don't feel like admitting to the world that I read. Some aren't even pleasure; they're just guilty. It just shows the mix of crap and gold that is my literary diet. It's like foie gras and Hamburger Helper. (And, yeah, the Ulysses thing was a total nonstarter. I still haven't returned it to the library, though.)

Anyway, I'm trying to get back on track, so here are the memorable things I've read recently:

• The aforementioned Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, by Junot Diaz: I read his short-story collection, Drown, in my Latino lit class, and it was okay. Nothing against Diaz; I'm just not the biggest fan of short stories. I want a big fat novel that I can really get into and stick with. (Into which I can really get, and with which I can stick.) The buzz on Wao was so overwhelming that I had to give it a shot, and thank God I did. This book is so good that it turns me into one of those inane chicks from the yogurt commercial: "It's massage good. It's snow day good." I love the characters; I love the voice. It's just bloody amazing, and everyone in the world should read it. The descriptions of the characters are brilliant; this one, about Belicia, really stuck with me:

"Beli at thirteen believed in love like a seventy-year-old widow who's been abandoned by family, husband, children, and fortune believes in God. Belicia was, if it was possible, even more susceptible to the Casanova Wave than many of her peers. Our girl was straight boycrazy. (To be called boycrazy in Santo Domingo is a singular distinction; it means that you can sustain infatuations that would reduce your average northamericana to cinders.)" (Diaz 88)

• Hungry, by Crystal Renn and Marjorie Ingall: Yes, I was intrigued by the idea of Renn's transformation from anorexic wannabe to zaftig goddess, but when I learned that Margie Ingall (from Sassy!!!) was the cowriter, I really got on board. I loved the book, and I came away from it with a ton of respect for Renn. It's incredible that, at such a young age, she was so determined to be herself and blaze a trail for others. This is a book that will make you feel good about yourself. I beat myself up over my weight for years, when honestly, it was never that much of an issue. I look at pictures of myself in high school, when I thought I was so disgusting-looking that no one would ever love me, and it makes me want to scream. If I could have had a role model like Crystal Renn back then, it would have made a huge difference. I'm so glad that my daughter will be able to read her story in those crucial years. Even if you think that a model's story could never be your thing, give this book a chance. Renn is smart and funny (once describing her typical lunch as "lettuce with a side of batshit"), and she gives a lot of insight into modeling. Turns out there's more to it than just standing there and looking bitchy!

Right now I'm reading The Help, by Kathryn Stockett. So far it's great; more later.