The Between Boyfriends Book

The Between Boyfriends Book
Cindy Chupack
159 pages

"The Between Boyfriends Book: A Collection of Cautiously Hopeful Essays" is by Cindy Chupack, a writer for Sex and the City.  The essays are observations Cindy has made about being single and dating, and they are all DEAD ON.  I loved this book because she hit every nail on the head and it was a book I could totally relate to, even though she is at least 10 years older than me.  I would definitely recommend this book for all of us single ladies.  In fact, I'm calling it the *unofficial* Single Girl bible. Love love loved it. Here are some of my fave observations: 

*Lone Rangered: to have had a relationship end in a mysterious and annoying way--with no goodbye, no answers, just the vague feeling that you have no idea who that man is.

*Relationship Equivalency Exam: A test that would allow you to earn credit for past dating experience so you could pick up a new relationship where the old one left off.

*Imposter Complex: What a relationship columnist might feel when she is not currently in a relationship, has not been able to maintain a relationship, does not have any prospects for a new relationship, nor does she seem to have a funny term for this predicament. 

*Carmunication: The language used by fathers when communicating with their adult daughters, basically consisting of the phrase, "How's the car?"

*Do Not Resuscitate Romance (DNRR) Order: A directive that you are not, under any circumstances, allowed to revive or "restart the heart" of a past relationship

And those are just the titles of a few essays. So you KNOW the essays are going to be good. Also, the author is a Midwestern girl, so she doesn't have the jaded outlook that some big city girls might have.

I can't say enough good things about this book. If you're a single lady, please go read it. You'll relate to all of the observations, and you might even be able to look at a situation in a new way. 

How To Be Single

How To Be Single
Liz Tuccillo
354 pages


“How To Be Single” is a fiction novel about Julie, a writer who travels around the world interviewing single women to see how women in other cultures know “how to be single”.  Along the way, she falls in love, gets her heart broken, watches her friends fall in love and have their hearts broken, blah blah blah.

I read this book because 1) it was by a writer of my fave show (Sex and the City) and one of my fave books (He's Just Not That Into You), and 2) I’ve been single going on 2 years now, and I was curious as to whether this books would have any tips on “how to be single” that I hadn’t thought of before.

Of course, the characters are in their 30s and single in New York City, where as I am in my 20s and single in Missouri. So not quite the same dating game, but *maybe* the rules could still apply.

Some of the events in the book are pretty farfetched, but it's still a good read. And it's pretty interesting what "being single" means to women in other cultures.

The book is a little too long (by about 100 pages) but I would still recommend it.