Rating: 
Summary: Fun Read
Review: A lot of attention was paid to McInerney's "Bright Lights, Big City" but I, and a co-worker (who, unlike myself, doesn't read much and has a short attention span), both really enjoyed this book much more. A nice, light read, and funny.I thought "Bright Lights, Big City" was just average, but I thought McInerney's "Brightness Falls" was just AWFUL. If you're interested in reading McInerney's work, start with "Story of My Life."
Rating:
Summary: a portrait of alison pool
Review: after reading ellis' glamorama, where alison pool plays a minor role, i was interested to see he 'borrowed' this character from mcInerney who writes in a similar style portraying this little 'post-modern girl' with perhaps a little more insight than Ellis gives into his characters everyday life and background. i don't know, i love all these books the way i love to pop a few xanax or codeine in the winter time and curl up on the couch and stare at the ceiling.
Rating:
Summary: Refreshingly subtle
Review: All the reviewers here who complain about this book's lack of a real plot are missing the point. STORY OF MY LIFE is a character observation in the purest sense. McInerney plops us down into Allison Poole's world with remarkable ease; we see the world through her eyes, but are thankfully spared any "oh woe is me" tirades so typical of fictional female narration. Allison knows what she wants and she goes after it, and the deeper reasons for her self-destructive life in the fast lane are only hinted at, as if she herself was shutting them out of her mind. This book doesn't need any explicit plot - we're simply taking a look at the lifestyle of the young, rich, and disillusioned.
The characters in STORY are also more vivid than those in McInerney's landmark BRIGHT LIGHTS, BIG CITY, and they're much more likable. The situations ring true to life whether you're the offpsring of posh socialites or not. And even though Allison's tone is breezy and the pace lightning-quick, there are some deep emotions running beneath the surface. Thankfully, McInerney leaves it up to us to make the connections between the characters' actions and their motiviations, eliminating the need for overwraught "emotional" scenes or sentimental treacle. The proof is in the pudding.
STORY OF MY LIFE paints its picture in broad strokes rather than intimate details. It's a refreshing change of pace, and it still holds up as a modern-day cautionary tale 17 years after its original publication. Check it out.
Rating:
Summary: Throw away Bright Lights
Review: I read A LOT, and I would have to commend Jay for his ability to write through the eyes of the opposite sex. My only conplaint for the book is that there was very little conflict. I am a sucker for books about addicts. I love them. If you enjoyed this I would love to reccomend: Disco Bloodbath by: James St. James, Fuel-Injected Sreams by: James Robert Baker, Kiss me Judas By: Will Christopher Baer. If you have not read LORD VISHNU"S LOVE HANDLES By: Will Clark GET IT NOW!!!! It is the funniest book I have ever read. I had to hide when I was reading it becuase I kept cracking up while I was reading in public. You will thank me- get it- get it now!!!
Rating: 
Summary: An over the top party girl
Review: If this were a story of a party girl without the baggage, I probably would have enjoyed it more. This girl has serious problems. Maybe they are family caused as the book tries to allude or maybe it's the easy money which suddenly starts to dry up. Irrespective, this girl is so self-destructive that at some point it gets pathetic. But at least the book is consistent as virtually every other single girl in the book has self-destructive qualities. I'm somewhat surprised that a Women's Lib group didn't have problems with this book on that pretext. Irrespective, I did enjoy the book visualizing the single life in New York in the 80s. Read this book if you want to know what the party scene in New York is like for a spoiled self-absorbed princess. If not, take a pass.
Rating: 
Summary: Big Print, Thick Paper
Review: Jay McInerney made a name for himself with his 1987 blockbuster Bright Lights Big City. He should have called this book, the 1989 followup, Big Print Thick Paper. Instead, he called it Story of My Life, which is just as well, since the protagonist, Alison, must utter that phrase 500 times. That in itself is a major factor in helping the fluff stretch out over 180 or 190 pages or so, but it doesn't help the narrative avoid sounding as if most of it appeared in word balloons over the heads of the main characters, like in a 1950s-style Real Life comic book. It's easy to write this book off as a product of the tail end of the most decadent decade in the U.S. since the Jazz Age (though the 1920s did at least give us some extraordinary literature), and there may be something to that point of view. But I choose to see it as the swan song of a self-indulgent literary style whose time had come before it really began and a writer whose success would have been impossible at any other point in history. In that respect, Story of My Life has some value as a sort of literary time capsule, a curious reminder of a time we'd rather forget. But is it worth reading now? Ask yourself this: what did Jay McInerney write next? Where did his career rise to after this exercise? If you know the answer, you get my point.
Rating:
Summary: Where's the story?
Review: Maybe I'm missing something here, but this "story" lacks a relevant plot and the climax, if it can be called that, is very, well, anticlimatic. Ms. Poole, the protagonist, runs around town doing drugs and pursuing a romance with a Wall Street-type guy ... and that's about it, for 180 pages. There are some minor episodes here and there, but mainly, very little happens throughout the book. It's peppered with pop culture references Ã` mentions of Nell's, Mick Jagger, trendy 80s drugs and various songs Ã` but, as is typical of the 80s, there is little flash behind the substance. The characters, who it's difficult to care about, fail to grow through Ellis' storytelling; one of them, Ms. Poole's love interest, grows only because, toward the end, the writer specifically tells the reader he did. The characters, furthermore, aren't very fleshed out, but hey, maybe that's the point. All in all, very little happens, and what does happen is pretty insignificant. The style of the book isn't too bad, but pick up another modern work if you're looking for that sort of thing.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting character development, but no real plot
Review: The author, Jay McInerney, is admirable for acomplishing a task of writing a novel in the voice of a 21 yr old main character, protagonist Alison Poole quite successfully. I felt like I was reading Alison's diary, but frankly, reading a diary of a 21 yr old bimbo proved to be quite annoying, especially when reading the infamous word "like" after every other word.... Basically it's a story of NY socialites in their early twenties acting like kids, doing coke, and just sleeping around with everyone they know. It's the dumbest story on earth, only because the percentage of people who act like this is 0.01%... So, although it's an interesting read, the storyline is very unrealistic, the language very dumb, and quite frankly, the climax, or should I say the anti-climax is NON-existent. The end of the story is quite boring and definitely disappoints. This could be an interesting read to teenagers obcessed with the likes of Paris Hilton, but to a grown mature adult, this book is useless. NOT RECOMMENDED -Alina Uzilov / 2004
Rating: 
Summary: I love this book
Review: This is one of my favorite books.
Rating: 
Summary: Complete Trash
Review: This is one of the worst books I've ever read. I don't usually review books here - in fact, this is my first - but I felt compelled to warn others about this travesty. This book has no plot, no character depth or development, and very little punctuation. It's just a small group of young women "dating" older men and doing a lot of cocaine. Sound exciting? It's not. It's incredibly dull. How can you live in New York, a city of 8 million, and run into the same 20 people (all of whom you've slept with) every day? I've lived in NYC for six years and have only once bumped into an ex-boyfriend (on the subway). There are many things that annoyed me about this book, but I'll only share a couple. First, it's written by a man. Not that I think men can never write female characters, it's just that Allison (the main character) seems less like any woman I know, than like some frat boy's idea of how women think and act (or how they wish we acted). Second, Allison constantly repeats the phrase "story of my (or his or her) life." OK, we get it already. Each time it becomes a little more irritating. Personally, I don't relate to, or find anything appealing about any of the characters in this book (except maybe the guy who wanted to stab the others - I would have liked to see him do some damage). They are all rich, vapid, obnoxious, and useless. If you like Bret Easton Ellis you will like this book. I also hated Less Than Zero, although even that was better written than this piece of garbage.
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