Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy – by Helen Fielding

Bridget Jones is crazy. I mean that in the best possible way – I love her! I’m also a fan of Helen Fielding in general. Cause Celeb was good, and I LOVED Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination (and not even just for that phenomenal title). But Bridget is my first Fielding love, as it should be.

The books, brilliant. The movies? Amazing. (Colin Firth. Enough said.) Bridget’s world is full of panic, disasters, incredible friendships, and trying family members as well as a whole lot of love, and it’s magical.

This third book was quite a tricky customer, though, for one very important SPOILER FILLED NO SERIOUSLY YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW THIS reason:

The Book of Luke – by Jenny O’Connell

Holiday time – you know what that means! Beach reads. Vacation fare. Quintessential chick/YA books that are light, fluffy, and preferably not at all challenging! I was also looking for books I could leave behind on my travels when I finished with them, to lighten my luggage load. I read The Book of Luke on a train between Venice and Innsbruck for an easy holiday read – and here’s what that was like:

Emily’s always been the nice girl. The brain, who’s focused on getting into a great college, and hasn’t got time for any of that “Standing up for yourself” nonsense. But when her boyfriend dumps her on the SAME DAY her parents are moving the family out of town against her wishes, the same day, too, that her Dad announces he’s not coming with them, Emily starts thinking it might be time to stop being so nice.

Moving back to her old town means Emily reconnects with her old friends, and one of them has just been callously dumped by her boyfriend too – by email, no less. The girls hatch a scheme: to create a guidebook for future generations about what not to do when dating an awesome girl. Using the ex, Luke, as a guinea pig for research purposes, and getting to dump him as hard as he dumped Emily’s friend when they’re done with him? Well, call that a perk.

I’ve Got Your Number – Sophie Kinsella

I’m a sucker for a good chick-lit blurb, and this one caught my eye a few months ago. I finally got the chance to read the book. Meet Poppy. Her life’s a wee bit complicated, with a wedding next week and a million things left to do.

Disaster! Poppy Wyatt’s lost her engagement ring (a priceless family heirloom ring, no less). Not only that, her phone’s been stolen! So there’s no way for the hotel to call her when they find the ring – until she finds a phone dumped in a bin in the hotel lobby. Thank goodness! Finders keepers, right? But as it turns out, this phone belongs to businessman Sam Roxton’s company, and he’d like it back, thank you very much. In order to use the number Poppy desperately offers to act as Sam’s PA for a few days. And if she accidentally reads some of the messages she’s passing on, well, that’s unavoidable really. And if she begins to help Sam out by organising a few things on his behalf, well, he should appreciate the help. Unless he doesn’t. Oh.