Making Minty Malone

Rating:
Summary: Even Better than Tiffany Trott!
Review: Having read and loved "The Trials of Tiffany Trott" I was eager to dive into "Making Minty Malone" - and I was not disappointed. This is a very funny and touching book. If you are one of millions of women who feel the need to be "nice" because you were raised to always be aware of other people's feelings, then you will relate to this tale. Minty has always been too nice and too willing to bend to other people's wishes. But when she is jilted in the middle of her wedding vows, this marks the beginning of a reincarnation for her. It takes her a while to get over her fiance (we as the reader know full well why he is such a louse!) but when she pulls herself together and gets on with her life and career she really blossoms and takes full control. This is one of those books where you really like the main character and want so much for her and I found it very hard to put down once I started it. A really fun read.

Rating:
Summary: I COULD NOT PUT THIS BOOK DOWN!
Review: I absolutely loved this book and just could not put it down. It was totally gripping, very, very heartwarming and so funny too. Tiffany Trott is a funny book, but I think this is even funnier, and the story is better. I loved the way Minty, dumped at the beginning by her terrible fiance just cannot see at first that she was complicit in what he did to her. She can't see it, but the reader can - and I think the author just skewers that kind of blindness so well - none of us wants to face the truth about ourselves, but Minty is finally forced to. Was she really as 'nice' as she thought she was, or wasn't she a bit shallow too? There are some truly great characters in this book - especially Amber, the awful novelist, who's so infuriatingly bossy to with, but by the end you realise just what a huge heart of gold she has - and what a great ally she is to Minty. I loved her talking parrot too - and the scenes with the adopted cat were just so touching. Only Citronella Pratt didn't seem to get a happy ending - but then she's the only character who doesn't deserve one because of the way she dumps on other women the whole time. But all of Wolff's characters are not only funny - they are very real and recognisable. Maybe Joe was just a bit too perfect, but that's my only reservation about what is a really wonderful, gripping, moving and screamingly funny book about a woman trying to get over a huge emotional trauma, and coming to realise the mistakes she made - before it's too late.

Rating:
Summary: Really funny!
Review: I actually should, given my rating system, likely give this book only 3 stars. But it's better than The Trials of Tiffany Trott, to which I gave 4 stars.

The story has already been described - Minty gets dumped on her wedding day, and the book covers how she gets over that hurt. Right from the beginning, Wolfe had me hooked. She used flashbacks in the initial chapter to introduce me to the main character, so I was better able to empathize with her situation. Anyone who gets dumped like that deserves empathy, but in a more 'global' way. By the time Dom dumps Minty, I had a sense of 'knowing' her, so I cared more. I was invested in the outcome. I loved that Minty did grow as the book progressed, and that her growth didn't occur too quickly.

The secondary characters were hilarious, and more effectively fleshed out than in some books of this nature. I genuinely was interested in the people Minty worked with. Her family was hilarious, too. The subplots worked, in that they were there to flesh out Minty's character, without taking away from the main story. They helped show who Minty is, and why she behaves as she does. I found myself laughing out loud quite often, which I haven't been able to say about a novel of this sort in quite a while.

There were a few things I didn't like about the book - for example, I didn't think Joe was particularly well defined. I actually thought Wolfe may have rushed with the Minty/Joe relationship at some points. But overall, the book was so funny (I absolutely adored the last quarter), that those complaints were minor. If you like chick lit, light summer reading and/or British fiction, you definitely want to read this book.

Rating:
Summary: What a mint of a book!
Review: Isabel Wolff does it again!

Minty Malone is all set to marry "Mr. Right" ~~ or so she thought ~~ only to be ditched at the altar in front of nearly 300 people. And that's just the beginning of a fun, self-discovery journey that Minty takes you upon. Devastated, she and her bridesmaid fled to France ~~ courtsey of the dumping Dominic ~~ there, she meets Joe while playing table football.

From then on, it's a merry tale of Minty trying to adjust to single life again. Her wacky cousin Amber moves in, Minty's job suffers upheavals and comic actions, Dominic gets engaged AND dumps his next finacee and TRYS to get back with Minty ~~ only she's smarter this time around. And there's Joe who keeps Minty at arms' length. This book is chock full of happenings ~~ it can leave you quite breathless. But I can guarantee this, you won't be bored.

You will find yourself rooting for Minty as she works to get through the embarassment of being dumped in front of the altar on her biggest day. There are chuckles aplenty in this book and lots of sighs over romances gone sour and/or gone beautifully. It is just a positive book and one that I will definitely read again! Don't delay ~~ pick it up as soon as you can. It's such a fun read ~~ you can't beat it.

Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable But Too Many Of These Books
Review: I enjoyed this book and found it light, funny entertainment. However, there may now be too many of this "Bridget Jones" or "Lucy Sullivan" type book in the marketplace. They all feature a single heroine who lives and works in London. She navigates the rocky shoals of her love and career lives with an assortment of oddball characters. This novel has many charms but all of these books do. Dominic, the fiancé, literally leaves Minty, the heroine, at the altar in front of 280 wedding guests. This is a huge blow to her self-esteem and the remainder of the book details her recovery. In that process, she also meets the hero and gets a leg up on her career in talk radio. Secondary characters are very funny. There is her cousin, Amber, who does not ever need to take assertiveness training but who goes for it with Minty. Minty's charity-addicted fundraising mother embraces every weird cause that exists. Her news anchor at work, Melinda, can't pronounce her "r"s but finds her true calling in an early morning show for insomniacs where she reviles the guests. Plus there's an obnoxious interviewee who lauds herself as mother and wife for the radio show, while dumping on all other women not married and with children. The comedic possibilities with Dominic, an insurance salesman solely focused on his upscale career and lifestyle, could have been more fully exploited. The funniest scene in the book is his backing out of the wedding by telling the minister he thinks "not" when he asks him if he will take Minty as his bride. Without any explanation, he then turns, marches down the aisle, alone, and leaves the church.

Rating:
Summary: Overall the book is..
Review: This book seems to start off at a pretty good start. It is about This woman named Minty Malone who is about to marry Dominic Lane. Right before they said their vows to each other, he says that he cannot marry her and he runs off. This devastates Minty. Then her cousin comes crying to her in her flat explaining that Charlie (her cousin's BF) dumped her because he wanted kids and she did not. So the cousin (amber) moves in Minty's flat and they both gripe about their men who dumped them. Although, Minty does not quite agree to the griping that amber is doing because minty thought charlie was quite nice. Minty gets back to work and tries to stay busy to keep her mind off dominic, and boy does she stay busy. Not only is she busy with her work, but she is also busy doing other peoples work. She is such a pushover nad so "nice" that eventually she cant stand it anymore and she goes to a course in if you have problems being nice. I wont tell you anymore of it. Only thing I noticed were that there were some errors in grammar or spelling, not much..but it is quite annoying. =) but this is an OVERALL good read.

Rating:
Summary: Mostly really good, with pesky problems
Review: For the most part, I really enjoyed this book. It was the smartest piece of chick-lit I've read and I liked the story and the character. Both were consistent throughout the book.

My problems were small ones. First off, although I enjoyed the character and felt she was pretty realistic and well-rounded (and she could cook!), I was seriously annoyed that she allowed herself to be walked all over by everyone. She realizes that this is her problem and even takes a class for it, but still allows her cousin to stay with her for months without paying rent or bills or anything and even allows her cousin to change her furniture around and take her bedroom. I don't know anyone who would just allow herself to be stomped on like that and past wanting the character to succeed, I wanted to knock some spine into her.

I also felt that the book was a bit too long. Cut out about one hundred pages (and the mom-charity debacle and peripheral-characters-getting-theirs subplots) and it would have been just about perfect. She could also have cut out about 90% of the "mint" puns. "New Mint" as a way to show that Minty's changing is only clever once.

Overall, though, I strongly recommend this. It's more drama than comedy, but it's still funny and witty and thoroughly enjoyable. Definitely one of the top tier of the genre.

Rating:
Summary: Not as Funny as Tiffany...But Just as Good
Review: Wolff is a very engaging writer, and this book was well worth the read. It took me three days to read it, and a few times I even hid it on my lap under my desk at work, so that I could get a few pages in here and there...The character development was at its best with Minty- who had a lot of growing and maturing to do. Unlike many books, where personality flaws are suddenly overcome in a lazy rush in the last chapter, the subtle growth of Minty was flawless- never was it "in your face," and the end result was a very convincing and realtistic.

This book was not humorous in the 'laugh-out-loud' sense- though, it did have its moments..Only one scene comes to mind that I considered to be truly "funny," and that was the party at Jack's house.

This was much more on par with "Out of the Blue," both in layout, plot, and style, as opposed to "Tiffany."

I couldn't put it down- Isabel Wolff never disappoints.

Rating:
Summary: Jilted!
Review: Well, the premise of this book came off a little bit different than the current trend. Here you have a heroine who's actually getting married instead of just wishing she were. Only...she doesn't. From then on, in discovering her lousy ex-fiancé, we start discovering more about Minty. I'm so sure many people will be able to relate to her niceness and the tendency to start tolerating things and not be able to stop (Dominic's abuse, the bossy Amber, her mom, her useless coworkers).

I'd read The Trials of Tiffany Trott but enjoyed this one more. I found it a bit more refreshing to embark in Minty's adventure to discover herself and actually see her succeed at it than in the journey of a single girl in search of a man. What better way than to have Minty discover so many things in the company of well-written and developed characters? (you'll be annoyed by Melinda, trust me)

I found it freshly written though some of the passages do tend to drag on for a while. It's still very enjoyable and if you enjoy the Brit-chick trend, you'll get a kick out of this book.

And Tiffany Trott even makes a cameo!

Rating:
Summary: An easy fun read
Review: Fun lighthearted, romantic story. I like the way the author ties all of her book characters together somehow. I've read 3 of her books so far and have yet to be disappointed. If you are into 'chick-lit' this is a must.