Rating: 
Summary: Engaging Read!
Review: If you've ever gotten engaged, or simply wanted to, or even if you've only thought about it, then this book is for you. Lynda Curnyn's characters are endearing and flawed and totally likable. She has an obvious love for NYC, which filters itself into virtually every bit of scenery, and a real appreciation for the human condition. Angie DiFranco is a girl trying to get her life on track by getting engaged and finding comfort in her current career path, despite the fact that her boyfriend Kirk isn't ready to make a committment and her job bores her to tears. She embarks on a brilliant scheme to make that man come around but ends up coming to her own realizations about what she wants and where she wants her life to go. I would give this five stars, if not for my feelings about Kirk's character. That aside, however, it's a thoroughly engaging read.
Rating:
Summary: delightful Manhattan romantic romp
Review: In New York, actress Angie DiFranco wonders if she will always serve as the woman who "loosen the lid" so some other woman marries her ex boyfriends. Three times that has happened to her. However, she thinks this time she might have the spouse as her current boyfriend Kirk was seeing his previous girlfriend for three years before breaking up. She believes that if there is justice in the world, the ex will have been the lid opener for her to marry Kirk. Angie begins her campaign to make Kirk jealous and ultimately into proposing. Her scheme works perfectly but as the wedding day nears she has doubts that he is the one. Instead, she finds herself suddenly attracted to her roommate Justin, but he has lovers all over the country and surely cannot reciprocate or does he? Though Angela's lid theory on marriage seems a bit jarred, fans will relish this delightful Manhattan romantic romp. The story line will amuse fans of chick lit due to the neurotic charming lead character. Angie's hesitation after finally being on the verge of obtaining what she thinks she wants is marvelous as she wonders if she is opening the wrong lid. Harriet Klausner
Rating:
Summary: An "Engaging" Tale
Review: Is it possible that a girl can "loosen" a guy up so much that he's marriage material ----- for the NEXT girl he dates? It is for Angie DiFranco, main character in Lynda Curnyn's new Red Dress Inc novel "Engaging Men." Angie really begins to rethink her dating habits once the THIRD in string of her former boyfriends becomes engaged and ready for marriage. Is it her? Is she the one that makes them ready for the alter, just not with her? Angie's current boyfriend, Kirk seems to be just what a girl needs. He's been "loosened" by his former flame and Angie thinks that her luck may just be changing. "Engaging Men" is a fun trip into the dating world where marriage seems to be the answer to Angie's prayers. Makes you wonder if it's a bad idea to hope and wish for something a little too much. A fun beach read --- really easy and not too difficult for the summer days on the sand. Cheers!
Rating:
Summary: Interesting concept, gets a bit pat at the end
Review: New Yorker Angie DiFranco (sounds like Ani DiFranco) is a struggling actress from Brooklyn who is dating Kirk, a software engineer from Massachusetts. Three of Ange's ex-boyfriends are engaged and/or married and a friend points out that they were "loosened" --like tight lids -- by Angie, thus making them marriage-ready for the next one. Ange decides Kirk has been loosened bu his ex Susan, and now he should be ready to marry her. All it takes is a little manipulation on her part .... Thus Ange employs the wit and witticism of the various characters in her life (her co-workers at her part-time job as telemarketers for a woman's catalogue, her roommate Justin, her best friend from high school) in figuring out strategies to ensnare Kirk. Of course (and we all see this coming) she starts to wonder if she really wants Kirk after all. The book is still entertaining enough but it pales in comparison to the author's debut "Confessions of an Ex-Girlfriend" which was amazing. Another small but annoying fact is, whenever a character completely changes their mind about something, they would say he or she did a "360" -- that is a FULL CIRCLE back to the starting point -- they mean "180"! It is kind of annoying that these adults in NYC don't know something so basic and as a result they sound dumb, and it makes you not like them as much as you could have. I did have to laugh when Angie visits Kirk's family in Massachusetts --- her observations about New England are dead-on. Although I don't think I would refer to Logan Airport as "sterile and clean" as she did.
Rating:
Summary: Supports Idea that GenX is Clinging to Immaturity
Review: On a superficial level, actress Angie DiFranco of New York City wonders if she will always serve as the woman who 'loosen the lid' so some other woman marries her ex boyfriends. The author writes well in a lighthearted, humorous and engaging manner. Like the TV show Sex in the City, the impression is that the author is drawing on her own life experiences and observations. Danielle Crittenden, author of "What Our Mother Didn't Tell Us" makes the point that there are always two sides to every male-female relationship and that today's 25-35 year-old groups appears to be clinging to adolescence. Angie DeFranco is almost a caricature for Crittenden's work. 1. The heroine is 31 with two minimum-wage go-nowhere jobs. She's barely getting by and her plan for the future is to manipulate her boyfriend into marrying her BUT the idea of kids is something she'd prefer to do 'later' BUT time is running out.
2. Her time away from her male long-term relationship is spent beating the status of that relationship to death.
3. She wants a future husband with ambition and financial success - but does not want to support the necessary sacrifices that go with the territory.
4. She's broke herself - but ends her relationship with her fiancé over his reluctance to spend $10,000 on an engagement ring.
5. She obsesses over marriage and children - if not now - when?
6. Her philosophy is to be "happy" - which is not a bad philosophy. But determining what happiness IS and then working towards it never happens. Instead she flits from situation to situation based on her moods - and changes her relationship "working arrangement" with her "other" without consulting his needs and desires.
7. And ultimately, she's afraid of commitment - dumping her fiancé and falling into bed with her long-time roommate who appears to be one step away from living with his mother. The author manufactures a happy ending by having the "under-her-nose platonic male friend suddenly have a trust fund to compensate for his lack of professional success- an unlikely real-life event. And tellingly, the issue of children is pushed back into the indefinite future. If you accept this as a representational view of how many semi-young US women think, then the wonder is not that the divorce rate is approx. 50% but that it isn't higher.
Rating:
Summary: Enjoyment
Review: Plots like the one in this story is what I would call "realism romance". The problem that I find in realism romances is that the author spends more time talking about "oral" (ex. Zane, Dickey) and less on the plot. I enjoyed this story a lot because it actually had some dept to it & didn't spend more than half of the novel talking about sex (that gets old after the first few lines, especially if you aren't excited about the characters who are doing the "do"). The story talks about a woman in a fury to be married & just like in "Two Can Play that Game", the main character follows a game plan. But all kinds of funny obstables block her down the Marriage Path. My favorite character was Justin and Grace is almost exactly like my best friend. Curnyn took the time to build her characters before making them fall madly in love, have sex, blah blah blah and that is what's missing in most novels today! I love this story for that. But at the end she fell into the same old path and my heart sunk. And the annoying fact that she kept bringing up New York was repetitive. I would love to go to New York but the arrogance would get under my skin immediately. Brag about it once, brag about it twice, I'll even give you three times...but after that, ENOUGH! Besides the watering down, raunchy parts towards the end and the constant cheerleading of New York, this was a quick, engaging read.
Rating:
Summary: Enjoyment
Review: Plots like the one in this story is what I would call "realism romance". The problem that I find in realism romances is that the author spends more time talking about "oral" (ex. Zane, Dickey) and less on the plot. I enjoyed this story a lot because it actually had some dept to it & didn't spend more than half of the novel talking about sex (that gets old after the first few lines, especially if you aren't excited about the characters who are doing the "do"). The story talks about a woman in a fury to be married & just like in "Two Can Play that Game", the main character follows a game plan. But all kinds of funny obstables block her down the Marriage Path. My favorite character was Justin and Grace is almost exactly like my best friend. Curnyn took the time to build her characters before making them fall madly in love, have sex, blah blah blah and that is what's missing in most novels today! I love this story for that. But at the end she fell into the same old path and my heart sunk. And the annoying fact that she kept bringing up New York was repetitive. I would love to go to New York but the arrogance would get under my skin immediately. Brag about it once, brag about it twice, I'll even give you three times...but after that, ENOUGH! Besides the watering down, raunchy parts towards the end and the constant cheerleading of New York, this was a quick, engaging read.
Rating:
Summary: The Pressures of Marital Bliss...
Review: This book was absolutely delightful to read, having both an interesting plot and insightful moral lesson learned by the main character Angie DiFranco. As if being a 31 year old struggling actress in New York City wasn't hard enough, she has the pressure from today's society to find a man to marry. Angie's torn between satisfying this acceptance of society and her own unwillingness to commit to one man, especially one man that could be absolutely wrong for her. As soon as Kirk, Angie's love interest, is first introduced in the novel, the reader loves to hate him. Watching Angie through her ups and downs balancing love, friends, work and family is a joyous adventure. A nice light-hearted read is always fun. I can't wait for Lynda Curnyn's follow-up to Engaging Men, called Bombshell. It tracks the story of Angie DiFranco's best girl friend Grace, who is just as neurotic and lovable as Angie.
Rating:
Summary: Ok, for what it was
Review: This was another in the long line of chick-lit books, and it wasn't that bad. It was quite readable, funny at times, and followed the life of Angie and her quest for love and mariage. The title and the back cover are a bit misleading - this book is not really about a woman and all her ex-boyfriends. I thought it would be, so I was surpised by that. Instead, the book is about Angie and her romantic life with her boyfriend Kirk, and how her past relationships (and his) may affect thier future. The end is very easy to figure out by the third chapter, but the getting there was half the fun I guess. This is a recommended book for light reading and lazy days.
Rating:
Summary: Frothy, fun, and funny
Review: When three ex-boyfriends take the plunge into the state of presumed marital bliss, Angie begins to wonder what's wrong with her. Now there's Kirk, and Angie starts becoming mysterious in an effort to nudge him in the right direction. Then, when it begins to look as tho her plan is working, she has second thoughts...
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