“Good in Bed” is one of my Top Ten Favorite Books of All Time. It’s funny, it’s all about various relationships and there are even lesbians in it. Over the years, I’ve wondered whatever happened to Cannie Shapiro and Joy?
Well, Cannie turned into a scaredy cat housewife/closet writer and Joy turned into a typical teenager.
“Certain Girls” takes place 13 years after the end of “Good in Bed.” Cannie is married to Dr. K and Joy is in middle school, preparing for her bat mitzvah. We find out in flashbacks how they came to be here: how Cannie wrote her book, how she married, etc.
Cannie wrote a book right when Joy was about a year old and it became a best seller. Instantly, almost, she was famous. She had various problems related to that and never wrote another book under her own name. She did, however, write a series of sci-fi books for teens under a pen name. Now, it’s the 10th anniversary of her book and the publishers want to do some promotion. Add to that stress, Cannie’s relationship with Joy isn’t that great and then Joy reads Cannie’s book. Of course, Joy doesn’t tell Cannie or ask her about it – she tries to gather facts from Cannie’s friends and family and long-ago acquaintances.
The book’s ending ticked me off but over all it was good. Not as good as “Good in Bed” but still good. It was funny and once or twice made me cry.
I went to visit A Friend in a different city and didn’t feel like reading the book I took with me, so we found a used bookstore and decided to check it out. I mean, there are Borders and other regular bookstores but I generally find cooler things in used stores. This time, not so much.
However, I did get 3 books: 2 Piers Anthony and “Tales of a Drama Queen” by Lee Nichols. This was, I discovered to my horror only after I bought it, a Red Dress Ink book. Which means it’s published by Harlequin. Well, it wasn’t so bad. Not your standard formulaic Harlequin romance, which is good.
Elle Medina is a late 20s woman who has never held a job. She met her now-ex-fiance shortly after graduating from college and became a kept woman. That is, until he went on a business trip to Iowa and came home, after a week, married to another woman. Elle moves to Santa Barbara and lives with her high school best friend and decides to get a job, get an apartment and get a man.
For 279 pages, we read about how she screws up at every opportunity and learns how to be a grown up. It was interesting to me because she never actually did learn how to be a grown up when she was supposed to, so her experiences are similar to what a teenager might go through. Since I didn’t learn how to be an adult until late in life myself, I could relate. Oh, my issues weren’t that I didn’t get a job but there were other things. Elle is a likeable character and the story, while not deep, is entertaining. If you are looking for something fun and easy, this is a good choice.
