Review--Jemima J by Jane Green

Jemima J: A Novel About Ugly Ducklings and Swans by Jane Green
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Jemima Jones is overweight.  She is aware of this fact and she's okay with it.  She loves models and magazines and frequently cuts out their pictures and tapes them to her wall.  Currently she writes the Top Tips for the Kilburn Herald in London.  She would like to right features, like her friend Geraldine, but right now, she enjoys "proofing" the copy.  She has a crush on another colleague, Ben Williams and occasionally, the three hang out.  Ben is crushing on Geraldine, while Jemima is crushing on him.   After an internet seminar given by the newspaper, the trio decides to check it out what all the internet hype is about for themselves.  When they find a chat room called Cafe LA, Jemima becomes JJ and her world is flipped upside down.

JJ meets Brad in the chatroom and after talking for a while, they exchange photos.  Brad is a hunk and JJ is smoking hot, but Jemima is not and before she agrees to meet Brad in person, she has to lose about 100 pounds.  With this goal Jemima sets out to join a gym and get a personal trainer and the weight falls off. Armed with a new body and a new attitude, JJ is off to LA to meet Brad.  Is he going to be the man in the pictures?  Will they fall madly in love and will she finally get the man of her dreams?

Many women can relate to Jemima J.  She is self conscious about herself and how the world perceives her.  I could see myself in her shoes.  I was afraid for her when she went to meet a man on the other side of the world that she had met on the internet.  I wanted Ben to see her as more than a friend.  I wanted her roommates to not be such idiots.  Jemima is a character that you can understand and root for.



Second Title in Take Control of Your TBR 2015.


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Review--Gray Mountain by John Grisham

Gray Mountain by John Grisham
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Samantha Kofer is a real estate attorney working for a huge law firm in New York City.  When all of the banks go belly up so does Samantha's job.  She was given the option to being furloughed for one year and during that year, she is encouraged to volunteer during this year off at a non-profit that the firm has chosen.

Trying to find the right place to volunteer has been difficult since there are so many out of work lawyers who are all going through the same thing.  She found "The Mountain Legal Aid Clinic[who]ran its low-budget operations from an abandoned hardware store on Main Street in Brady, Virginia, population twenty-two hundred and declining with each census  Brady, was in southwest, Virginia, Appalachia, coal country."

In Brady, Samantha works with Mattie and Annette and meets many of their clients who are poor people in need of everything from simple divorces and wills to black lung disease claims  Mattie's nephew, Donovan, is also in Brady and his firm fights coal companies tooth and nail for the people of coal country who have been destroyed by their illegal practices. There are a lot of things that happen that help to shape Samantha into a more respectable lawyer, but they don't come without great loss.

John Grisham likes to get the heart of the matter, he likes to grip at your heartstrings so that you can feel the characters that he is portraying.  For a big New York City attorney, though, Samantha is not really a character I got to enjoy as much as I thought I would.  She seemed a bit of a wimp in some instances.  Whining about never setting foot in a courtroom or drafting a will.  I wanted to jump in the book and smack her one good time.  Whether or not you have done these things, you are a lawyer, and is this not in your job description?  This is one of the worse John Grisham books I have read.  It didn't have the same go getter attitude that the other books have.

Overall, the book kept me interested and wanting to know what was going to happen next.  There were parts that had me on the edge of my seat.  I'm wondering if there is going to be more from Samantha Kofer, because the story seemed unfinished.



First title in Take Control of Your TBR 2015!



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