Happy April Fool’s Day and Easter (if you celebrate)! I’m excited to start this month with a new — and different — book than we’ve previously read in my book club. For the month of April we will read ‘Eleanor Oliphant is completely fine’ by Gail Honeyman.
I’ve read amazing reviews on this book, and one of my book club members brought it to me as a gift because her mother’s book club raved about it, and after looking into it more, I’m quite interested! It is not our usual self help/self improvement pick, but a few meetings back we decided that we want to read encouraging books that cause you to be introspective and do some critical thinking… Eleanor’s story seems to fit right into that idea.
I also heard that Reese Witherspoon loved the book so much that she has recently purchased the rights to this book to create the film… so… if the murmurs are true, that’s pretty awesome!
To purchase a copy, click here.
As always, I also give you a short update on our thoughts on last month’s book which happened to be, ‘You are a Badass’ by Jen Sincero. I’ll be honest, our group had a lot of differing opinions on this book… so I’ll include the thoughts that most closely align with my overall assessment.
- This book is wonderfully positive and certainly makes you want to stop whatever you’re doing and become the best, most successful version of yourself… and gives you some guiding principles to make that happen
- In a lot of ways this book is oversimplified and while it is motivating, it doesn’t seem to answer a lot of questions that one may have if they were to embark on such a journey
- The chapter on “money” really struck a nerve with some because it doesn’t take into account jobs in which the pay is set low and always will be — think a teacher — no matter how hard you work or how much drive you have; that being said, for a business venture this chapter makes real sense
- I personally really enjoyed how she discussed God, Source Energy, a Higher Power, positive vibes, etc. I found that she did a good job at allowing any belief system to still be acknowledged… no one would feel alienated in my opinion
- This book is really good for people who perhaps are willing to engage in a lifestyle change without asking a lot of questions… which can be seen as good or bad, but in my view it is good for anyone who just needs a push and maybe overly positive enforcement that if you can’t see yourself in a better spot and you aren’t willing to do the work, you will always find yourself in the same place… never moving forward
Overall, I actually really liked the book. I do think there’s some missing pieces, but in the end it accomplished what I had hoped. I found the book easy to read because of Sincero’s writing style, I was reminded of some ideas I’ve previously heard but appreciated more this time because she included steps in how to change your life for the better, and really… sometimes you just need that person who is going to say, “you can do it if you put your mind to it!” even if it seems a little questionable.
To purchase a copy click here.
If you’ve read any great books this year that I should share with my book club, let me know! I’d love to hear from you.
Photo credit: @courtofpages (Instagram)
