Modern Romance by Aziz Ansari

When young people seek companionship in the twenty-first century, it's different from how their parents and grandparents had it. Today's technology and increased population make the options for romance occasionally overwhelming. In his first book, comedian and actor Aziz Ansari takes a good look at what modern romance really consists of.

This is not the typical book that you might find written by a celebrity. It's not a memoir or a quick cash-grab, it's a well researched look at love that Ansari wrote alongside sociologist Eric Klinenberg. At the same time it does contain numerous bits of the comedian's sarcasm and a few examples of his own struggles with finding a mate. Some of the topics that he examines come from conversations with audience members at his standup shows, such as when he asks them to show him their text message conversations.

Ansari and Klinenberg take a look at the paradox of choice that daters face. With the advent of online dating, there are so many options available that someone might worry that they're not with the "best" person possible. Ansari contrasts this to how his father had an arranged marriage, which he also addresses on his Netflix show Master of None. The authors took trips to Tokyo, Buenos Aires, and Paris to see how those countries handle dating, in comparison with how Americans do. Ansari found that in Tokyo men were usually too shy to approach women, while in Buenos Aires the males were perhaps too aggressive with their advances.

Aziz Ansari has a signature way of pointing out the absurdities of his generation's behavior while admitting he falls into the same habits. It seems that researching and writing this book gave him insight into not only other people's behavior in relationships, but also his own.

I recommend Modern Romance to anyone in their 20s or 30s who's curious about the subject and doesn't mind Ansari's sense of humor, as there are points when he'll exaggerate or go on a tangent for the sake of a laugh. A side note, the audiobook version has some added content at the beginning and end. At the start of the first CD in specific, Aziz berates the listener for being "too lazy" to read the text and lamenting that he has to "read it to you". That was a surprise that gave me a good chuckle.

To buy the book or learn more, go to book.azizansari.com. However, the site hasn't been updated since it still talks about preordering the book despite it coming out last June.

Landline by Rainbow Rowell

Marriages aren't easy. Sometimes when the going gets rough, one may wonder whether they are meant to be with this person. After becoming well known for her novels for young adults, with Landline Rainbow Rowell examines a marriage at such a turning point.

Georgie McCool lives in Los Angeles with her husband Neal and their two daughters. For Christmas, they planned to go to Neal's childhood home in Omaha, Nebraska. But Georgie, a TV writer, has to stay in California to write for a new show, so Neal takes the girls himself. Georgie doesn't want to stay in their house alone so she decides to stay with her mother and 18-year-old sister. Georgie's mom keeps asking why Neal "left" her, and Georgie begins to believe her marriage is in trouble despite repeated verbal denial.

To make matters worse, Neal won't answer his cell phone, so Georgie uses her mother's landline to call Neal's mother's house. Neal answers, but something seems off; he doesn't mention their daughters and he speaks as if his father is alive despite the man dying three years prior. Eventually Georgie realizes that she is talking to her husband 15 years in the past, during a similar Christmas week before they got married. She makes excuses to herself at first, believing this to be a persistent hallucination, but comes to realize she may be able to affect her present by changing her past.

The mystery of the phone is a compelling through-line, but what will keep you reading Landline is the relationship between Georgie and Neal. We get flashbacks to how they met and the tension caused by Georgie's close friendship with her co-worker. She also worries that Neal resents living in Los Angeles since that was for her career and there's nothing there for him. This may seem like some heavy drama, but considering Georgie is a comedy writer and Neal used to draw a comic strip, there is plenty of levity to be found between them as well.

Landline is a good depiction of a realistically flawed marriage with an imaginative, thought-provoking fantasy element. Most people have imagined the possibility of going back to correct past mistakes, but usually it's better to learn from them since that's the better way to use our time.

For more information about this book or the author, visit Rowell's website.

The Master Magician by Charlie N. Holmberg

Two years after the events of The Glass Magician, Ceony Twill is ready to take her magician's exam. Things are going well for her: she can switch materials at will, Folding's a cinch, and you get the impression early on that Emery Thane is going to marry her. Enter conflict: the Excisioner, Saraj Prendi, escapes from prison! Then, because of her relationship with Thane, she is reassigned to another Folder for her exam (Pritwin Bailey, who appeared briefly in The Paper Magician as a memory in Thane's heart).

This book was a good conclusion to the trilogy but as a standalone novel, it lacked depth. I find most of the characters one dimensional. In this novel, we meet Pritwin Bailey and his apprentice, Bennet Cooper. Pritwin is a grumpy perfectionist who is not satisfied with Ceony because she does not give him her undivided attention (which, as an actual Folder, shouldn't she?) but we never get into why or anything else about him. And where Prit is unfriendly, Bennet is so friendly that Ceony assumes he's in love with her (and I'm not sure he is) and he does not develop further.

I still really like the world and the mechanics that Ms. Holmberg has created but I think her characters are a bit underdeveloped. Sometimes they seem more like props than actual people. In the previous novels, where you can be distracted by the mechanics of Paper or Glass magic, this one focuses on Ceony's ability to change mediums which, I'm sorry to say, isn't that interesting. And then after everything's all nice and tidy, she ends on a (albeit weak) cliffhanger! It was disappointing. I hope she writes more novels in this world.

Visit Charlie N. Holmberg's site for more information about the author and how to purchase her book(s).

The Not So Secret Emails Of Coco Pinchard by Robert Bryndza

This book was brought to my attention by BookBub (deal expired).

There are two reasons why I downloaded this book without giving it much thought: first, it was free, and second, it is made up entirely of emails and I wanted to see what that looked like. The style is jarring at first but after a while, I got used to it. Each chapter is a month of emails from her Sent items, many of which to one or both of her longtime friends Chris and Marika. The familiarity between Coco and her recipients made it difficult at first but after a while, I found the characters familiar and followed easier.

We meet up with Coco at Christmas in London after she has published her first book, Chasing Diana Spencer. She is celebrating with her husband, Daniel, her college-age son, Rosencrantz, her mother-in-law, Ethel, her sister-in-law, Meryl, and Meryl's husband Tony. Coco does not keep up the pretense that her life is perfect and we witness as it unravels. First, Coco catches Daniel cheating on her in the bed that they share and they divorce. Then Coco's literary agent drops her as her publisher decides to recall and pulp her novel. So in a couple of strokes, Mr. Bryndza has stripped Ms. Pinchard of her career and her relationship. She goes through a depression, but as with all "feel good romantic comedies" when a door closes, a window opens, and Coco finds a new normal.

Honestly, I'm not sure what I expected in how the emails would look like but I found myself surprised at their format. You get a date/time, an email address, and the body of the message. Also, as I mentioned before, you have to get through several emails before you get into the groove of the characters because you are effectively peeking into someone's Sent items and they aren't assuming you don't know these people in their life. The other thing I found strange (in that I don't expect anyone writes emails like this) is that Coco tends to start describing a scene and then writes out the dialogue like a normal novel which makes it not feel like an email anymore.

That being said, I liked this book. Coco is endearing and as I read, I was rooting for her. She made the classic mistakes when someone has been betrayed, rejected, and humiliated and while I found myself wanting to shake her out of it, she worked it out and came out on the other side better for the experience. It is the first in a set of three, with a promise of more on the author's website. I don't have plans to read anymore in the series in the near future (I have too many other things I want to read) so that leaves them in my list in the distant future.

Visit Robert Bryndza's website for more information about the author and how to purchase his books.