Customer Reviews

Engaging Men

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4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

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.

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.

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.

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...

Angie's ex-boyfriends all seemed to get engaged AFTER she breaks up with them. This time, she's going to get her current beau to "pop the question" so his next girlfriend doesn't benefit from all of her "lid loosening" - a cute term that her friend Michelle describes in detail. This book rings true as many men have that commitment phobe issue, and Angie is likeable and easy to relate to.

I wasn't able to really get into this book until 2/3 the way through. After which, the pages started really turning for me. I thought the beginning of the book was OK, but LOVED the last hundred pages. Curnyn's book Confessions of an Ex-Girlfriend was the same way for me...starting slow but really picking up near the end.

Curnyn creates cute stories and I'll be picking up her third book, Bombshell, when it comes out in May.

300 pages of this is agony. Not only that, we do not need to know everything that happens in a day. I felt like I was watching the lead character's life on screen without any edits. I read the 1st 150 in earnest & just skimmed the last half. Angie whines all the time- fights with her selfish beau, is equally selfish herself and satisfied with mind games, then whines some more, meets the beau's uptight parents who no one would like- only then to fall into the arms of her roommate, the guy who has been there all along. Okay, I can deal with some predictablility in this genre, but not to this degree- the writing is dull and flaccid & uninspiring. I don't know why I read these books other than I feel like I have to know what is bad to know what is good. Save your money and time, please!

Engaging men seemed to be the story of my life...a good man, a great man...and a bunch of women who throw it all together. Angie reminded me so much of myself it wasn't even funny! She has 2 men...one who loves her and one who THINKS he loves her.......thank god she finally came to her senses and ended up with the right one.

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...

On a superficial level, actress Angie DiFranco of New York City wonders if she will always serve as the woman who ï¿loosen the lidï¿ 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 todayï¿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 sheï¿d prefer to do ï¿laterï¿ 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.

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.