Abigail M. read and liked Heather's review of L.A. Candy (L.A. Candy, #1):

"L.A. Candy is to MTV what The Devil Wears Prada is to Vogue. Only Lauren Conrad is a better writer. (You heard me!) "

Abigail M. read and liked Ashley's review of A Wrinkle in Time (Time Series, #1):

"I read this book a very long time ago, so long ago that I don't even remember when or where, and I usually remember exactly those kinds of details. The only things that I remembered from my first go round were these: the name Charles Wallace on a dar...more I read this book a very long time ago, so long ago that I don't even remember when or where, and I usually remember exactly those kinds of details. The only things that I remembered from my first go round were these: the name Charles Wallace on a dark and stormy night, a man with red eyes, and a sense of something terrifying that was too big for me to understand. Since that (unknown) date, I've had this book in the back of my mind as this large, mythical thing, and I never knew why.

It's a horrible shame that I missed the right window to read this as a kid. I was too young the first time, too old the second. Don't get me wrong. I loved it, read it in about two hours. But I'd lost that sense of horror and wonder that was the only thing left from my first read, that sense you get as a kid that the universe is a vast and wonderful place and that you'll never understand it, that things can just appear fully formed out of nowhere, and they're perfect and right, and that's they way it will always and should always be.

Man, I wish I was a kid again, just to get that back without even trying.(less) "

Abigail M. read and liked Heather's review of The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner's Semester at America's Holiest University:

"When A.J. Jacobs was writing The Year of Living Biblically, he took on a slave (unpaid intern). The slave was Kevin Roose. After visiting Thomas Road Baptist Church (sanctuary of Jerry Falwell) with Jacobs, Roose decided to take a semester off at Bro...more When A.J. Jacobs was writing The Year of Living Biblically, he took on a slave (unpaid intern). The slave was Kevin Roose. After visiting Thomas Road Baptist Church (sanctuary of Jerry Falwell) with Jacobs, Roose decided to take a semester off at Brown and enroll undercover at Liberty University (Kingdom of Jerry Falwell).

What Roose finds at Liberty is an anomaly that changes his world. There is overt (faculty-encouraged) homophobia, antiquated views on race, and an emphasis on de-intellectualizing Christians. But there are also genuinely warm, empathetic, intelligent people who become a second family to him.

His friends at Liberty seem to fear the secular world, while his liberal family (including his favorite lesbian aunts) seem to fear the evangelical world. In both cases, they only know the malevolent hype about one another.

This book is at once infuriating and heart-warming. It was like reading the exact opposite of my life story. (less) "