Book Review: Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me By Mindy Kaling

My first book of 2013 was a fluffy one:

(Click to view on Amazon)

The synopsis from Amazon:

Mindy Kaling has lived many lives: the obedient child of immigrant professionals, a timid chubster afraid of her own bike, a Ben Affleck–impersonating Off-Broadway performer and playwright, and, finally, a comedy writer and actress prone to starting fights with her friends and coworkers with the sentence “Can I just say one last thing about this, and then I swear I’ll shut up about it?” ….

*****

In Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, Mindy invites readers on a tour of her life and her unscientific observations on romance, friendship, and Hollywood, with several conveniently placed stopping points for you to run errands and make phone calls. ….

In the book, Mindy shares stories from her childhood, college, and working on The Office. It’s part biography, part essay, part girlfriend-recounting-silly-adventures. The persona reminds me more of Mindy’s character in The Mindy Project than her character in The Office. I enjoyed her snarky sense of humor and the not-quite-self-deprecating way she retold some of her misadventures. Making the obvious comparison to Tina Fey’s Bossypants (which she does herself, so it’s OK), Mindy’s book is similar, but not quite as good –it didn’t have as many laugh-out-loud moments or make-you-think essays.

*     *     *     *     *

During my holiday movie-fest, I saw the previews for the new Great Gatsby movie so many times that I am afraid I already have seen the best parts. I think I still want to see the movie when it comes out, but I decided that I wanted to re-read the book first.

(Click to view on Amazon)

I thought at least one of my kids had read it for a high school English class, and I found a copy in my son’s room just in time to pack for for my trans-Atlantic flight. I saved it for my 9.5 hour flight home, and between that time in the air, the hour we spent on the tarmac before take-off, and the hour it took to clear customs, I only had about 10 pages left to read when I got home. (I also did some work, watched a movie, and ate several meals and snacks during that flight!)

I am not going to “review” a classic, but if you are planning to see the movie, you might want to read (or re-read) the book first. Even if I hadn’t been buckled into my seat for over  10 hours, I wouldn’t have wanted to put it down.

What are you reading?