Book 48 of 52: No Regrets

I was just lamenting to someone the other day about the poor quality of galleys I picked up at Book Expo America. Galleys, if you're not in the biz, are preview copies of books that are given to folks like me in the hopes that we will write about them. I usually pick up so many good books that I'm set reading wise for months.

This year? I didn't like anything I grabbed. I also said that a lot of books coming out seem like longer versions of Glamour magazine articles, and I have little love for Glamour. It's one of those women's magazines you can rely on to tell you the same three things every issue: you're too fat, you don't please your significant other, and you're going to die young (probably of breast cancer).

Sarah Ivens, author of No Regrets: 101 Fabulous Things to Do Before You're Too Old, Married, or Pregnant, has written for Glamour and another one I love to hate, Cosmo. She's was editor-at-large for OK! magazine, which is in a boat load of financial trouble (she left in December). The book definitely recalls a pre-recession time. It tells women to do things like Shop Till you Drop in New York City, Buy a Burberry Trench Coat and take fabulous trips to far flung countries as "must do" while I know most of us are just trying to hang on and save every penny we have.

And, yes, it reads like a really long Glamour magazine article (without the "you're going to die young" part though it does focus on looking younger and skinnier -- Spanx aren't something everyone should do to feel better about themselves), but it's not ALL bad. I can see someone in a rut, whether from heart ache, job ache or general ennui, finding some of these 101 things to do inspiring. It's a "kick in the pants" kind of book -- just skip over some of the sillier suggestions, like getting fake eyelashes and get a Brazilian wax. Really? Not something everyone needs to do.

I've done 59 of the 101 things she recommends. I did pretty well up until the travel and beauty parts. With travel, I can't afford a lot of the vacation suggestions. For beauty, it's stuff I would never want to do or can't do (can't dye my hair back to my childhood color since I don't dye my hair and, yes, it's the same color). Not bad for someone who has little interest in the magazines the author writes/wrote for.

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Book 23 of 52: Because of Miss Bridgerton by Julia Quinn

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Book 12 of 52: Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi

Marjane Satrapi is an author and graphic novelist who grew up in Iran and, as a tween and teen, lived in the country through the Iranian Revolution before her parents sent her to Europe for school, and for her safety. As an adult, she wrote Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood , a nonfiction graphic novel, originally in French. I read the English translation, which was published in 2003, three years after the original. It was a critical success, won a slew of awards, and became a movie . I haven't read the sequel, Persepolis 2 , but I hope to (you can also buy them in a set . I found Persepolis in a Little Free Library, or I'd have bought them combined). In the tradition of Art Spiegelman's Maus , which is about the author's father talking to him about the Holocaust, Persepolis is a memoir of trauma told through a mix of images and words that when combined, combust into powerful, beautiful and soul cracking art. For example, Satrapi portrays the 1978 Cinema R

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