Bet Me

Rating:
Summary: Shoes Shoes Shoes.....
Review: A girl can not have enough good shoes. This book has plenty. Not only shoes but great characters that keep you wanting to know more about them and the relationships that are built from this book. I love Jennifer Crusie and this book has become my new favorite by her.
The love trinagles are great and the story keeps you laughing all the way to the end. There are a few parts of the book you do not see coming and it only adds to this great story.
Go and read it right now! You will not be disapointed!!
Got to love Jennifer Crusie!

Rating:
Summary: Bet Me is a spunky and charming novel
Review: Bet Me is a fabulous book. Though it had a rough start, it really picked up towards the end. The main plot of the book is about Minerva Dobbs, a practical, sworn off of men, carb counter, who is being swooned by Cal. Cal is a serial dater that always wins his bets. When Cal recieves a bet to try to make Min fall in love with him, his world goes crazy. To make it worse, Min knows about the bet. First, they argue over everything and decide not to see each other, but fate has other plans. Where ever they go, they accidently bump into each other. They each finally realize that they love one another. Min tells Cal that she knows about the bet and he decides to throw it, but Min decides the prize is to great to risk. Ten thousand dollars and true love is too precious to let go.

Rating:
Summary: Read and re-read
Review: Crusie is the best in contemporary romantic fiction- but you've got to like some laughs; if passionate pathos and despair are your thing, you won't be pleased. Bet Me is at the top of my list of her books, though Faking It and Welcome to Temptation are duking it out for pure entertainment value. Her dialogue and situations are outstanding. Her books step on the edges of suspension of disbelief without ever going near the shores of Dynasty type writing. Her characters are fully rounded with flaws, families and friends that just make us like them more. Reading a Crusie novel is the best form of escapism. She has a fabulous sense of humor and her heros are perfect for being so far from perfect and therefore believable fantasies. She writes a sex scene like no one else. The hero is never virile and unbelievably potent and the gasps usually (initially) come from something stuck in the cushions under the couch. Then they deal. The most unlikely, yet lovely, aspect is that her heros want to talk and figure out how to do better in the future. Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: My First (and not last) Crusie
Review: For months I've had "Bet Me" sitting on the top of my TBR pile. A good friend just raved about Jennifer Crusie, and since I'd turned her into a Suzanne Brockmann fan, she felt justified in turning me toward Crusie's collective works. So when I finally got around to opening this book, it was with great expectation.

I'm glad to say that I wasn't let down. "Bet Me" was such a treat to read. The humor was wonderful, and I was immediately taken with both the hero, Calvin Morrisey, and the heroine, Minerva Dobbs.

Instantly the characters had a chemistry with each other despite the fact that they both tried to fight it through nearly the entire book. What was exceptionally clever is how Crusie brought attention to this connection by using a secondary character - a psychologist ex-girlfriend of Cal's - to list clues indicating if the couple was developing feelings, only to have those very clues show up in Cal and Minerva's interactions with each other.

The only problems I had with this book were Minn's mother and Minn's obsession with her weight. Minn's mother was so extreme in her nastiness - in her complete fixation on her daughter's physical appearance and disapproval of same - that she almost came off as a cartoon character. I kept waiting for Minn to turn around and smack the woman, mother or not, especially given that Minn felt no compunction in speaking her mind to every other character. And while it was completely understandable why Minn herself was so obsessed with her weight, it really became annoying that it was such a significant obstacle between Cal and Minn. Cal never expressed anything but appreciation for Minn's figure, yet Minn could not let him forget that it was less than her definition of perfect.

Still, it was refreshing to read about a woman who didn't conform to society's (and romance readers') expectation of physical perfection and an amazing, sexy desirable man who loved her all the same. The dialogue between these two was wonderfully real, fast paced and at times, wicked. Once they allowed their passion to run free, the scenes were downright steamy.

I've already got a whole stack of Crusie's just begging to be read. I can only hope they are all as good as "Bet Me".


Rating:
Summary: I figured out why its not great
Review: I am listening to the CD, after giving the book a quick read when it came out. The premise is great, but the dialog gets boring because its all "xx"Cal Said then "xx"Min Said "xx"Bonnie said "xxx"David Said. The word SAID must have been used 10,000 times in this book. It slows down otherwise snappy dialogue.

Rating:
Summary: Lack of pronouns distracting
Review: I know this is a trivial matter, but I've been listening to "Bet on Me" on CD over the past day or so on a long road trip. I find the "Min said," "Cal said," "Nannette said," etc. very distracting. In a conversation between two people, even on an audiobook read by one person, "she" or "he" would suffice. Again, I'm not reading it, and in my head it could be completely different, but this lack of personal pronouns is very choppy and distracting to the story.

Otherwise, I'm enjoying it.

And I'm a grammar snob. Maybe an abridgement would be helpful for the audio version of Ms. Crusie's books.

Rating:
Summary: Dessert for the mind
Review: I loved Jennifer Crusie's latest Lake Woebegone, where all the women are smart, all the men are adoring, and everyone is wealthy and beautiful. No matter how unrealistic her universe is, it's FUN. And funny. Crusie inserts jokes and it's not until later in your day (when you will still be thinking about the book) that you realize they were jokes. And hot. Crusie can write a sex scene that will leave you shaking without being crude or (particularly) explicit.

In short: Crusie writes "fiction for women" that does justice to both fiction and women. Read this book at the dinner table.


Rating:
Summary: Delightful read with full figured heroine and devilsh hero
Review: I loved this book! The characters Min and Cal are delightful in their battle to fight their attraction and resist love. She has a controlling mom who has programmed her to hate her roundness. He is a serial dater with a determined Ex who wants him back. She is sassy and talks back. He gives as good as she does. The banter. The dialog. The sexiness without explicit sex- the friendships and depth of characters and cast make this one a must read and read again!

Jennifer Crusie is the voice for single women over 30 who want the fairytale and the unreality of reality that goes along with it.Primo! And can I say bravo to Crusie for another book with a couple who are happy as non-breeders- this is so rare which is why they stand out. Not all women want kids- nor do all men. They do like Krispy Kreme donuts though!

Rating:
Summary: New Fan of Crusie!
Review: I'd never read any of Crusie's books, until I picked this one up at the store after it caught my eye. I have to say, I've already went out and bought a few more of her books, because if they're as good as "Bet Me"- I'm a new fan & I'm hooked!

We first meet Min Dobbs as her boyfriend is breaking up with her- in a bar- for not sleeping with him. Thank god her friends are there for support, and so are some good looking available men. Cal catches her eye and she's definitely interested, until she sees him talking to her now ex-boyfriend & making a bet that he can't get her into bed in 1 month! No longer interested in his good looks, out of spite she does agree to leave the bar with Cal. Only, this casual acquaintance seems to take a life on of it's own...and Min & Cal begin running into each other where ever they go. Their love/hate relationship becomes irresistable, even though both of them try to deny it.

This book was such a pleasant, fun read! Very quickly I became attached to the characters in the book, the friends of Cal & Min, their families, even their conspiring Ex's! I think this is one of the best romantic comedy books I've read in a long time. As another reviewer put it, the dialogue and situations in the book are realistic, they do not come off as contrived or fake- as some books do. I'd certainly love to see a movie version of this book- and like I said, I'll be reading much more of Crusie in the future!

Rating:
Summary: A Winning Book Recommended for all Chick Lit Fans
Review: Is there such a thing as a fairy tale romance? Does anyone ever live happily ever after? Actuary Minerva Dobbs finds out in BET ME, the latest in a string of Chick Lit books written by the popular author Jennifer Crusie. In this story, the focus is on a young woman who does not wear a size six dress nor cares about how she appears to the opposite sex. She is tired of the dating scene and of her criticizing mother, and is ready to move in with a cat.

The story opens in a bar in New York with Minerva and her soon-to-be ex-boyfriend David breaking up. Apparently he is not happy that she has refused to have sex with him during their entire dating relationship, and he decides it's time to move on. Not that Minerva cares; she is actually relieved. She was tired of David's advice on how to lose weight and what not to eat, and wished that he could have accepted her the way she was. She leaves David and seeks out her two best friends, Bonnie and Liza, who are waiting for her at the bar.

Min soon notices a trio of men across the way who are watching them. Three guys for three gals --- a perfect match. So Min decides to go over there and see what's up. As she approaches, she overhears them talking about her (in a rather unflattering way) and the man who has caught her eye is making a bet with his friends that he can convince her to go out to dinner with him by the end of the evening. On that note, Min runs back to her safe corner with Bonnie and Liza, and as the women wait, the man who caught her attention, Calvin Morissey, walks over to them, and subsequently asks Min out to dinner. Min accepts.

What Min does not know is that David was the one who made this initial bet with Cal. She also isn't aware that David bet Cal $10,000 that Cal could not get Min to have sex with him within a month. David thinks this is an easy win for him, since he is under the impression that Min simply is not interested in sex. But what David does not understand is that Min simply was not interested in David, period. Cal, on the other hand, has a reputation for never losing a bet. He does not take David's sex bet seriously, but nevertheless wins the $10 bet regarding dinner with Min, thanks to her eavesdropping just minutes earlier. She basically went out with Cal just to infuriate David.

From that point on, the crazy up and down friendship between Cal and Min begins. The two are obviously attracted to each other, but they drive each other nuts. It's like oil and water. They talk, they tease, they flirt. But neither one wants to admit that there is anything going on between them. Bonnie and Liza notice that something exciting IS going on between the two, and so do Cal's friends, Tony and Roger. Soon, the six of them become regular buddies, with Roger and Bonnie falling in love, Tony and Liza "dating" but with no serious intentions for a commitment, and Cal and Min arguing, flirting and stealing kisses every now and then.

Min soon sees another part of Cal's life --- his personal relationship with his family, his ex-girlfriend Cynthie (who is secretly plotting a way to get Cal back), and a childhood that left Cal scarred and scared about being a failure. Cal also meets Min's wacky family, including a sister who is having pre-wedding jitters, an overbearing mother and an overprotective father who may be having an affair with his secretary.

BET ME is a winning book. Although this reviewer feels it went on a bit too long, Jennifer Crusie does an excellent job creating some very funny characters. We see each individual written into this story as someone uniquely important in his or her own right, yet integral to the love story of Cal and Min. There are subplots that surround the fairy tale; although at first this reviewer did not see the point in throwing in all of these characters, it all comes together nicely by the end of the book. BET ME is recommended for all fans of Chick Lit.

--- Reviewed by Marie Hashima Lofton