There's a (Slight) Chance I Might Be Going to Hell by Laurie Notaro

Maye is having trouble meeting people since she and her husband moved to Washington. He works at the local college and has a built-in way to meet new friends, but without kids and with a stay-at-home consulting job Maye's short on new friend opportunities. Her bumbling attempts to meet people culminate in the decision to compete in the town's version of a talent show: the Sewer Pipe Queen Pageant.

It's a goofy story filled with comic mishaps and a mild mystery. The book's certainly not high art but it's also not the standard chick-lit: Maye is middle-aged, overweight and more than a little socially challenged.

It took until about page 20 to realize I'd already read this book. It's not the kind of book I would have re-read on purpose, but I was bored and I couldn't remember the end. So I read it again.

The other half of my heart

by Sundee T. Frazier

OK, so the most historic days of civil rights in in American history took place before I was born. Even still, I remember learning about Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks in school. This book talks about that history a little, and shows how individuals can still sometimes feel less than whole when surrounded by people whose skin is another color. The twist in Frazier's novel is that it is a story of twins born to one white parent and one black parent. One girl appears black, the other appears white. Minni, the blue-eyed redhead has always admired her sister's outgoing personality and never questioned how Kiera feels as one of the very few black children in their community. Suddenly, the girls are to spend part of their summer visiting their grandmother in the deep south. The purpose of the trip is the Miss Black Pearl Program (pageant). Now Minni begins to question her own strength and ability to embrace both sides of her ancestry.