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80th out of 418 books
—
345 voters
How to Eat a Cupcake
by
Meg Donohue (Goodreads Author)
Funny, free-spirited Annie Quintana and sophisticated, ambitious Julia St. Clair come from two different worlds. Yet, as the daughter of the St. Clair’s housekeeper, Annie grew up in Julia’s San Francisco mansion and they forged a bond that only two little girls who know nothing of class differences and scholarships could—until a life-altering betrayal destroyed their frie...more
Paperback, 309 pages
Published
March 13th 2012
by William Morrow Paperbacks
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Sep 26, 2012
Mrs Mommy Booknerd http://mrsmommybooknerd.blogspot.com
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Shelves:
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Donohue has blasted her debut novel right out of the ballpark. It was moving, believable, well written and real. The characters were well developed and despite their imperfections you found yourself rooting for them, grieving with them, celebrating with them...just simply feeling for them throughout the entire novel. The novel was perfectly paced and it kept me engaged from start to finish. Just when I thought I may have figured things out Donohue threw me for a loop. I am so excited to see what...more
Meg Donohue's How to Eat a Cupcake is story about friendship. Annie and Julia were as close as sisters, but once they hit theirs teens that bond of friendship started to tarnish. Annie, years later still feels the sting of betrayal but she's willing to give it a try when Julia wants to open a cupcakery together. Slowly those wounds begin to open again, but this time around both Annie and Julia are prepared to listen to each other.
How to Eat a Cupcake is one of those books that I couldn't put do...more
How to Eat a Cupcake is one of those books that I couldn't put do...more
Estranged friends Julia and Anna are reunited after ten years and open a cupcakery together. They work hard to build a successful business and attempt to rebuild their friendship after difficult high school years destroyed their relationship. Meanwhile, Julia struggles with a past trauma and planning her upcoming wedding, while Anna still tries to comes to terms with her mother's untimely death, while dating a man who seems all wrong for her.
"How To Eat a Cupcake" is boring chick lit with compl...more
"How To Eat a Cupcake" is boring chick lit with compl...more
You know I love me a good chick lit book, but I've grown frustrated with most of what I have read recently. Every story sounds like another book I have read. I feel like this is like a few books but we changed up the setting and put some cupcakes in it.
Part of what made this just a mediocre book for me is that it never hooked me, drew me in to keep reading. I could predict everything that happened, the fights/arguments between Annie and Julia, and the ending. And it's so frustrating because I f...more
Part of what made this just a mediocre book for me is that it never hooked me, drew me in to keep reading. I could predict everything that happened, the fights/arguments between Annie and Julia, and the ending. And it's so frustrating because I f...more
When I began reading this book I thought it might be a 5 star but as it progressed, the plot seemed too contrived. This story (or fairytale) is set in San Francisco where we have two good looking, intelligent, hardworking, independent women who were raised together in a Pacific Heights home. One girl was the only daughter of the wealthy parents who owned the home and the other girl was the illegitimate child of an Ecuadorian teenager who became their cook. The two girls were raised together and...more
It only seems fitting that I would read How to Eat a Cupcake as I was on my way to France. The French are apparently obsessed with cupcakes and we are obsessed with their macarons. Why not read a book about the love of baking as I was headed over to the pastry capital of the world. I am proud to say that I gave this book to the front desk clerk at my hotel in Paris and she was delighted by it. You would think that I was giving her freshly baked cupcakes.
How to Eat a Cupcake is a book after my he...more
How to Eat a Cupcake is a book after my he...more
Two young 20 something "friends" work to repair a relationship that went terribly wrong when they were in a private High School in San Francisco. Annie and her mother had come from Ecuador to live in the carriage house on the property of the Pacific Palisades Mansion of the St. Clair's. Lucia had fled her home country when she was pregnant with Annie at the age of 16. Lolly and Tad St.Clair had a baby daughter, Julia as well. Lucia was the nanny and the girls grew up together as childhood friend...more
I'll admit the "idea" of a book that involved cupcakes intrigued me. Maybe I was just hungry for something sweet at the time. And this book did encourage that craving...
How to Eat a Cupcake is a light read. It is slow-going at first, but by the last third of the book it does pick up its pace (finally). But unfortunately if you can hang on that long, your patience isn't really rewarded. I was hoping for a sweet story of lost friendship found. And while that is a small part of the main storyline,...more
How to Eat a Cupcake is a light read. It is slow-going at first, but by the last third of the book it does pick up its pace (finally). But unfortunately if you can hang on that long, your patience isn't really rewarded. I was hoping for a sweet story of lost friendship found. And while that is a small part of the main storyline,...more
I gained weight with every page
I live in San Francisco, where this novel is so evocatively set. After the coldest, dreariest, rainiest week ever, I felt I deserved a treat. I pulled How to Eat a Cupcake off the shelf.
At the novel’s heart, are two very different women with a shared past. Annie Quintana grew up in the carriage house of the St. Clair’s Pacific Heights mansion. Her mother, Lucia, was the nanny to Julia St. Clair, and the two girls were raised practically as sisters. They were the cl...more
I live in San Francisco, where this novel is so evocatively set. After the coldest, dreariest, rainiest week ever, I felt I deserved a treat. I pulled How to Eat a Cupcake off the shelf.
At the novel’s heart, are two very different women with a shared past. Annie Quintana grew up in the carriage house of the St. Clair’s Pacific Heights mansion. Her mother, Lucia, was the nanny to Julia St. Clair, and the two girls were raised practically as sisters. They were the cl...more
Annie Quintana and Julia St. Clair as a different as night is to day. Separated by ten years, the two find themselves brought together once again. Julia St. Clair is ambitious, sophisticated and is very wealthy. The only daughter of the St. Clair family, she is in the planning process of her wedding to Wesley, a Southern businessman but is hiding a secret she must tell him before she marries. Julia finds herself with time on her hands now that she has quit her job to move back home to San Franci...more
Julia St. Clair comes from wealth, whereas, Annie does not. If it was not for the fact that Annie’s mom used to work for the St. Clair’s than Annie and Julia would never be friends. Julia and Annie used to have a close bond but than a tragic event tore them apart.
Years later, Julia’s mother is hosting a party and convinces Annie to cater and bring her cupcakes. It is at this party that Julia and Annie will reconnect. They decide to go into business together and start their own cupcake shop.
Fir...more
Years later, Julia’s mother is hosting a party and convinces Annie to cater and bring her cupcakes. It is at this party that Julia and Annie will reconnect. They decide to go into business together and start their own cupcake shop.
Fir...more
Meg Donohue's debut work, "How to Eat a Cupcake", is as well-prepared and appealing as the various exquisite cupcake creations described throughout the book! Food is such an integral part of our lives, not just for sustenance, but also for comfort and celebration. Food is also a universal communicator. Many times in our lives we express emotions that we cannot verbalize through cooking and sharing food. Annie Quintara is a baker of captivating cupcakes--blissful bites bursting with familiar flav...more
Annie and Julia grew up together in the same house, almost like sisters. Almost, but not quite. Julia’s parents owned the house the two lived in and employed Annie’s mother as the housekeeper. Annie and Julia were friends until gossip, initiated and then shared by Julia and her friends, almost ruined Annie’s life.
Time passes and Annie and Julia meet again and Julia decides to help Annie open a cupcake shop. Hard feelings still exist and Annie and Julia must work at their new relationship if the...more
Time passes and Annie and Julia meet again and Julia decides to help Annie open a cupcake shop. Hard feelings still exist and Annie and Julia must work at their new relationship if the...more
Mmmm, cupcakes! Mmmm, books about cupcakes. I love foodie fiction and I was very excited to read this book because 1. it's about cupcakes and 2. I had heard some good things about this book from some other book bloggers (and we all know that book bloggers are awesome so there's that). This is also a story about a redeemed friendship.
I really liked both of the main characters in the book. Annie seems like a person that I would really like to be friends with. She seems like a lot of fun. Julia doe...more
I really liked both of the main characters in the book. Annie seems like a person that I would really like to be friends with. She seems like a lot of fun. Julia doe...more
I totally enjoyed this book and read it quickly. I liked the structure of it, a split narrative between Annie and Julia which allows the reader to get inside both girls heads and see the same experiences from their different points of view. It was fun, mysterious and had a lot of heart....and cupcakes! I enjoyed the journey more than the destination on this one....It was a fantastic read, the writing was wonderful and the characters felt very real, but things kind of fell apart for me toward the...more
This book was like an underbaked cupcake. Too many flavors, too many themes and way, way too many cliches. If the author had written a book about two 20 somethings who tried to repair their friendship by going into business together, it might have been a sweet, albeit, light story. Instead, Donahue tries to cover every imaginable theme in only 300 pages, and so does justice to none of them.
And the cliches!!! Of course Julia is tall, thin, blond, gorgeous and rich. Of course Annie is short and cu...more
And the cliches!!! Of course Julia is tall, thin, blond, gorgeous and rich. Of course Annie is short and cu...more
I loved pretty much everything about this book. Like a cupcake, it's girly and sweet and fun and satisfying, and I wished I could still enjoy it long after it was gone.
The characters are well-developed and believable, and I thought every conversation rang true. I was completely caught up in all of the plotlines. I liked the way the book is set up - with each girl alternating chapters and giving her point of view. It made me feel that I really understood both of them. Every character was like a r...more
The characters are well-developed and believable, and I thought every conversation rang true. I was completely caught up in all of the plotlines. I liked the way the book is set up - with each girl alternating chapters and giving her point of view. It made me feel that I really understood both of them. Every character was like a r...more
I really liked the way that the author told Annie and Julia's story. The timeline went from June to May with the chapters alternating between the two young women. It was almost as if they were sitting in front of you, telling you the story as a friend. There were times I wanted to laugh and times I wanted to cry and times I wanted to shake one of them to open up their eyes as to what was in front of them!
The girls grew up together since they were babies - they might as well have been sisters....more
The girls grew up together since they were babies - they might as well have been sisters....more
How to Eat a Cupcake is a book that seems like it would be a fluff piece. It is not! This is the story of Annie and Julia who both grew up in the wealthy St. Clair family home. The difference between them was that Annie was the daughter of the nanny/cook and Julia was a St. Clair. The book begins several years after Annie’s mother has died while at work in the kitchen and Annie is coming back for a party, bringing cupcakes she has made at the bakery where she works. She and Julia are no longer f...more
A quick read, picked up on impulse at the library, versus reading a review or being a fan of a particular author, which is how I usually select titles. This was a first novel. Bit of a fluff actor here, and some predictable stereotypes, but hey -- cupcakes were involved (!), so I gave it a try. I love to bake, can you tell? No recipes here unfortunately (sigh). Rich girl Julie/poor girl Annie, a love triangle and some family secrets form the main plot elements. Once best friends, almost like sis...more
Jan 17, 2013
Marathon County Public Library
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Shelves:
mcpl-review,
adult-chick-lit
Annie Quintana is a talented but underpaid baker in San Francisco and the daughter of the wealthy St. Clair family's former housekeeper. When Julia, the prodigal St. Clair daughter and Annie's erstwhile friend, returns to her home, the two women rekindle their friendship and open a cupcake shop. They also stir up some buried feuds and solve the mystery of Annie's mother's death. "How to Eat a Cupcake" makes for good chick lit. The alternating perspective between Annie and Julia helps keep the st
...more
When I first picked up this book I was expecting it to be a light frivolous read. I mean, how to eat a cupcake doesn't sound too serious, right? But I was happily surprised. I can see from the other reviews that you will either love it or hate it. I fall into the love it group.
Julia & Annie did start off as stereotypical characters. But by the end of the book there was so many more layers to them beneath the surface that they became more believable to me. I liked that each chapter devoted...more
Book Overview:
Funny, free-spirited Annie Quintana and sophisticated, ambitious Julia St. Clair could not be more different. Yet, as the daughter of the St. Clair’s housekeeper, Annie grew up side-by-side with Julia in the St. Clair’s San Francisco mansion and the girls were as close as sisters until a life-altering betrayal destroyed their friendship.
A decade later, Annie has become a talented, if underpaid, pastry chef who bakes to fill the void left in her heart by her mother’s death. Julia,...more
Funny, free-spirited Annie Quintana and sophisticated, ambitious Julia St. Clair could not be more different. Yet, as the daughter of the St. Clair’s housekeeper, Annie grew up side-by-side with Julia in the St. Clair’s San Francisco mansion and the girls were as close as sisters until a life-altering betrayal destroyed their friendship.
A decade later, Annie has become a talented, if underpaid, pastry chef who bakes to fill the void left in her heart by her mother’s death. Julia,...more
My sister loaned it to me after her book club read and enjoyed it. I think they even had the author out to answer questions. This book is about a sister-type relationship with two characters who had a major falling out years before. They open a business together, work at repairing their rift and help each other figure out what needs figuring. It covers sister issues, the relationship of employers and domestic employees and the power of communication and how it can affect your life in both positi...more
This started out as many chick lit novels do, with two young women (Annie and Julia) who grew up as best friends who had a major falling out during the 'mean girl' high school years. Fast forward ten years to the beginning of the novel, and via family connections (Lolly St. Claire, Julia's mother), Annie has arrived at the St. Claire home for the first time in a long time, cupcakes in tow for Lolly's charity event. Julia has recently quit her job and moved back home before her upcoming wedding....more
Part chick lit, part mystery, How To Eat A Cupcake was surprisingly really good. The writing style was interesting and easy to follow and I quickly became immersed in the character's lives and who they were as people.
Annie Quintana and Julia St. Clair were the best of friends growing up. Annie's mother Lucia was employed by Julia's mother, as a nanny for Julia as well as a cook. Not until the girls got older did they begin to notice and pay more attention to the differences in their backgrounds...more
Annie Quintana and Julia St. Clair were the best of friends growing up. Annie's mother Lucia was employed by Julia's mother, as a nanny for Julia as well as a cook. Not until the girls got older did they begin to notice and pay more attention to the differences in their backgrounds...more
Having waited for this book for several months (on the reserve list at the libarary) I was most anxious to jump into this. Sadly, almost as soon as I jumped in, I was ready to jump out. When I find myself dreading my reading, wishing I was reading the next thing in the stack or actually putting a book aside in favor of another then I know something is amiss. And that certainly was the case with this book.
It wasn't awful. (Although, neither was it great.) It was pretty clean - something I'm alwa...more
It wasn't awful. (Although, neither was it great.) It was pretty clean - something I'm alwa...more
No matter how you choose to eat a cupcake, Meg Donohue's debut novel, "How to Eat a Cupcake" is a deliciously sweet story about two long lost friends reunited after ten years of separation because of an incident that occurred between them years ago.
First, the icing on the cupcake is that I absolutely love Meg Donohue's style of writing. She constructs her words beautifully to tell the story. I felt like I knew the characters so well and not only cheered them on but longed for everything to work...more
First, the icing on the cupcake is that I absolutely love Meg Donohue's style of writing. She constructs her words beautifully to tell the story. I felt like I knew the characters so well and not only cheered them on but longed for everything to work...more
It's no secret that I adore books that are centered around bakeries or cupcakes so I knew that this book would go on my to be reviewed pile and when I requested it, I was excited because it sounded like a good story. I'm glad to see that I wasn't mistaken with that assumption.
I really getting to know Annie and Julia. This book is told through the points of views from both Julia and Annie. Julia and Annie are childhood best friends who drifted apart. Annie's mother worked for Julia's mother and s...more
I really getting to know Annie and Julia. This book is told through the points of views from both Julia and Annie. Julia and Annie are childhood best friends who drifted apart. Annie's mother worked for Julia's mother and s...more
This book was entertaining. It falls within 3 possible categories: mystery, food, and chick-lit. The mystery aspect is actually a little obvious, especially if you've read a lot of mystery novels. When the "reveal" happened and then later the stalker discovered, it wasn't a surprise. The food aspect was a tiny bit stronger - clearly the book is about baking and cooking (especially about organic ingredients). It's quite current and plausible, given all the cupcake places that have opened up in th...more
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CUPCAKES WAR READ...: OUR CHAT WITH MEG DONOHUE | 5 | 16 | May 02, 2012 07:40pm | |
| CUPCAKES WAR READ...: Place to Come for Chat with Meg Donohue | 136 | 16 | Apr 25, 2012 06:30pm | |
| CUPCAKES WAR READ...: Author Meg Donohue Date Set! Sign Up for Author Chat | 6 | 14 | Apr 24, 2012 04:59pm |
Meg Donohue is the author of the bestselling novel How to Eat a Cupcake, which was translated into Dutch, German, Italian, and Polish, and the forthcoming All the Summer Girls. She has an MFA from Columbia University and a BA from Dartmouth College. Born and raised in Philadelphia, she now lives San Francisco with her husband, two young daughters, and dog.
More about Meg Donohue...
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