Enjoying a slice of BOMC birthday cake

As I’ve mentioned before, I have been a member of the Book of the Month club for about a year now, which makes me eligible for certain perks now.

Since April is my birth month (I share that  particular day with Al Pacino!), BOMC gives me a free book in my regular order and I was excited indeed to receive such an early birthday gift!

My special selection for this occasion was a new release ,Advika and the Hollywood Wives by Kirthana Ramisetti. The leading lady of this story and the title is a young woman who went to Hollywood hoping to become a screenwriter but instead finds the closest she can get to stardom is by tending bar at an Oscar party.

At that party, she meets Julian, a big league film producer who has won numerous awards and has at least three ex-wives to his dubious credit. Despite that background, Advika is swept off her feet and marries Julian rather quickly, which brings her into a whole new world of drama.

For one thing, Evie Lockhart, actress and one of Julian’s former wives, has a clause in her will that grants Advika a million dollars if she divorces him. Another of her new husband’s exes, Nova, a singer has several of her albums discussing her marriage and Wife number Three is headlining a reality show based on the infamous nature of that marriage.

Harboring some serious regrets about rushing into this relationship, Advika decides to look further into Julian’s life to see if she can undo this hasty misstep into marriage without too much damage done.

I haven’t read Ramisetti before but I do like the premise and it sounds like a mix of heartfelt emotions and behind the scenes of La La Land fun. I do hope that there’s a bit of satirical snark tossed in for fictitious flavor as well:

I paired that with Curtis Sittenfeld’s  Romantic Comedy , set in the small screen world of late night television.

Sally Milz is one of the top writers for The Night Owls, a long running sketch comedy show that allows her to blow off steam about the double standards that she and other women still deal with in the entertainment industry.

This week’s celebrity host is Noah Brewster, a singer/songwriter that Sally would love to loathe but she just can’t. He happens to be a decent person and the chemistry between them is almost impossible to ignore.

Nevertheless, she manages to resist his charms as sincere as they might be, in order to avoid having her heart broken yet again by another too-good-to-be-true man. Is Sally right to hit pause on this relationship or should she fast forward to her true heart’s desire?

Sittenfeld does know her way around a smartly written romance with pop culture punch and adding some Saturday Night Live vibes to this plot line platform promises to be next level, Nora Ephron style with a tasty TV twist:

To round this out, my third pick was something completely different in the best sense of the term.

Lone Women by Victor LaValle takes place in 1915, as Adelaide Henry sets out for Montana to claim a piece of land under a provision in the law that lets single women and/or widows expand the US territories. All she has with her is a knowledge of farming and a locked trunk that holds more than family secrets.

Staking her claim among the folks of Big Sandy is not as bad as it seems at first. Yet it’s not long before suspicious eyes are turned in her direction and the true terrors contained within that trunk are not held back. Adelaide wants nothing more than to find some peace in life but the past may come back to haunt her in more ways than one and dangerous to others as well.

I have heard nothing but positive word of mouth about this book, plus critical praises to the skies. Historical horror fiction is tricky to pull off but LaValle has clearly done his homework here and adds his own engaging flair to the material. Sounds like good fright night fun to me:

As pleased as I am with my BOMC blue box selections, there was another book related development that gave me bore-birthday joy recently.

Over this past weekend, I was able to finally go to a physical bookstore which I haven’t been able to do in years.

I know this sounds trivial but for me, it was like touching grass. To be in such a bookish space with brand new hardcovers, paperbacks and other literary items as far as the eye can see was exhilarating. 

Sure, my local library is great and ordering books online has it’s advantages but walking among freshly printed books is akin to breathing in the aromas of a bakery that has just set out their fresh batch of treats for the day.

Picking only one book was difficult but fortunately, Mike Chen’s Vampire Weekend called out to me from the shelf it was waiting for me on.

 The story is centered around Louise, who had to abandon her musical dreams due to becoming a vampire but with the arrival of her young cousin Ian, might have those doused flames reignited by introducing him to the best that punk rock has to offer.

The best birthday presents are the unexpected ones, if you ask me and one way or another, I hope to have more of the page turning variety by the time my actual birthday cake is ready to be sliced: