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The Accidental Virgin

The Accidental Virgin

List Price: $13.95
Your Price: $10.46
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Not Great Literature, just Great Fun!
Review: If you go into this book expecting your normal chick lit novel, you'll be disappointed. This novel doesn't even aspire that high. What it does aspire to be is raucously funny, incredibly sexy (keep a fan and some iced tea handy) and a very quick read.

I agree with those who said the ending was a disappointment - it definitely was. I can think of lots of other ways to wrap this book up that would have been immensely more satisfying than its own ending. But with that exception, what fun!

Completely different from SMART VS. PRETTY.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Sexy steamy read!
Review: If you think this book is a serious tome on relationships between men and women and on love ~~ don't bother to pick this book up. If you are looking for a book that is pure escapism, fun, light, saucy and sexy ~~ this book is it! It is a very fun read ~~ I read it in two hours and had a great time reading it. Frankel's writing style is crisp and clear ~~ and very vivid. It is funny and I am being honest here, I couldn't stop turning the pages from the beginning to the end. It's been awhile since I can say that ~~ and I was fortunate enough to have an understanding husband who let me read this book uninterrupted while he took care of the babies.

Stacy is on a quest. She realized that in just one week, she will have been celibate for a year and not wanting to regain the "virgin" status she had worked so hard to get rid of sixteen years prior, she decided to find a man to break her celibate cycle. And this begins a riotous attempt to beat the end of the year. She works at an internet lingerie company, which was also having problems as well ~~ so in between meetings to save the company and setting off a new design line and meeting men ~~ Stacy's life quickly became a whirlwind. Preoccupied with sex, she bungles every attempt ~~ and it just gets more and more hectic towards the end of the book ~~ and more unpredictable.

Frankel didn't write the typical chick book ~~ where girl bemoans the lack of man, romance/sex in her life and obsessing over her weight and desires to have a family ~~ only to find that true happiness lies in herself all along. Nope. Frankel took a different twist on the single woman's life by allowing Stacy to be obsessed with sex and it was getting to the point where she didn't care ~~ and that's the fun part of this book. Frankel never leads the reader on to believe that this is a typical chick lit ~~ which is refreshing in itself for a change. Everything that can go wrong between a man and woman in that precoital haste ~~ happens in this book.

So, kick back and enjoy a few hours of escapism ~~ don't forget your diet coke or whatever you drink ~~ and just enjoy this book. Forget the real world for a few hours.

3-23-03

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Sex and money
Review: It is a truth universally acknowledged that the writer who recreates Jane Austen in modern guise faces some grave perils. She exposes herself to the wrath of Janeites for her temerity and to the the barbs of critics who ridicule her aspirations to comparison.(She also deprives herself of the fifth star that must be reserved for the Mistress).
Stacie Temple lives in Manhattan instead of Longbourn, is based in Thongs.com instead of the Bennet household, aspires to stock options rather than inherited estates and seeks sexual congress rather than marriage. For reasons that were not entirely clear to me (something she read on a WEB site) she must obtain her goal within a year. Each attempt is met with frustration (in many
senses of the word) under Feydeau farcical circumstances. The financial sub-plot runs separately and involves stratagems to keep Thongs.com solvent.
The rather explicit sex may be distasteful to Jane Austen fans, but perhaps I am stereotyping,and virtue does remain intact (Perhaps Clarissa, as well as Pride and Prejudice, was a model)
Frankel seeks to entertain rather than enlighten us, and thereby exposes herself to a further peril. The serious writer who wants to plumb the depths of the soul, expose corrupt governments, fight racial discrimination, or whatever, can afford (if not enjoy) rejection by readers who can be dismissed as unworthy to appreciate great art. For the writer who wants to entertain there is no appeal from the verdict of "I didn't like it."
I liked it.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: looking for fluff? read this one!
Review: Light, fast paced read and funny at times when Stacy trys to have sex with any guy she meets! She is trying to de-virgin herself after almost a year of no sex.

If you aren't looking for a deep plot and are in the mood for pure fluff - this is the book for you.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: There are no accidents
Review: Love the title, and subtitle. I liked Frankel's Smart vs. Pretty; I loved The Accidental Virgin. This is a funny book, full of sex (or almost sex). Let me explain: The story is about a woman, Stacy, who is one week away from the anniversary of the last time she had sex. She reads that being celibate for a whole year makes you a renewed virgin. Stacy is horrified to think she's a sexual zero at age 32, so she sets out to fix her little problem. She has no trouble meeting men (or women). The problems are in the men she meets. Won't say what happens on her dismal dates because Frankel takes great pains to come up with creative and surprising obstacles for Stacy's de-revirginization. Sexual misadventure would be enough for me, but Frankel makes the romantic quest suspenseful. I had to know what happened next. And I was completely satisfied (as it were) by the ending.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: The joke gets old.
Review: One does not pick up a book titled "The Accidental Virgin" and expect it to be squeaky clean, but this book has too much sex. Frankel obviously believes the slogan "sex sells" and she throws in everything she's got in a sort of desperate, overbearing way. There is nothing in this book that isn't about sex. Frankel even gives Stacy a job at a lingerie dotcom in an obvious attempt to keep things racey. How about a little realistic variety?

Because of this, Frankel is unable to focus on anything else long enough to create a decent and believable story. Stacy's quest to end her year-long drought is funny at first but it quickly gets old. The reader can predict the outcome of each new scenario, having just read the exact same set up (only with a different leading man) a few pages earlier. There's no plot variety, no growth, no realistic character arcs. And as others have stated, the ending is completely contrived and gag-inducing. Frankel tells the story in a kind of bored, detached voice, leaving me wondering if even she knew or liked the main character at all. Don't waste your time.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Shallow - even for chick lit
Review: Stacey hadn't had sex in almost a year. This hadn't bothered her, until a friend sends her an article calling women like her 'born again virgins'. What must a girl do? Have sex ASAP of course! From a casual date she doesn't like, or her ex, her closest male friend, her boss's son, or even by a female co worker.

The workplace situations were mildly funny, but not very original. The motivation for the 'desperate sex' on the other hand, was very unclear.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Screw getting my money back ... I want my time wasted back!
Review: Stacy is a woman on the verge of re-virginization - meaning, she's spent almost a year of her life in unconscious celebacy. Now, she's a woman on a mission to sleep with a man before, God forbid, she becomes a born-again virgin.

Thoughout the book, you get to read about her mishaps and failures (dozens of them, in fact) in trying to find that special (or not so special) man or woman who will save her from this terrible fate.

Are her mishaps funny? Sure. Hilarious, even. But the book is so over-the-top, you find yourself losing interest from the sheer ridiculousness of it all. Everytime you think she's FINALLY about to achieve her goal, you're let down. That's all fine and funny at first - but after awhile, it becomes redundant, tired and boring. Not to mention the incredibly horrible/ridiculous ending that will have you wondering if you accidentally wandered into the fantasy section of the book store. Don't waste your time OR your money.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: AuthorZone.Com Book Review
Review: Stacy Temple has been languishing in a near revirginiated state for almost a year without feeling the pinch (or should I say itch) to do something about it. Until bright and early Monday morning, that is, when a deli man's wink reddens her already pink cheeks, and has her literally running -- all right, tottering in kitten-heeled mules -- toward the nearest exit. Silly, to become so discomposed over a minor flirtation, if you could even call it that. Come to think of it, the unibrowed clerk's wink wasn't overly flirtatious at all. In fact, it was downright snide, even mocking, as if her dormant libido had emblazoned a flaming "V" on her forehead.

And that's when Stacy realizes exactly how long it's been since she euphemistically canoodled with a man: Nearly twelve, surprisingly frustration-free months. Venting her peak and burgeoning panic to her best friend, Charlie, has unexpected complications, however. Suddenly, her loveless love life is put in the spotlight, and a more unflattering view of it would be hard, err, difficult to come by. Standoffish, is she? Overwhelmed with work pressures, and too involved with the day-to-day workings of thongs.com to let the temptress inside of her free, huh? Well, we'll just see about that, Mr. Four Night Stand!

A week is plenty of time to ferret out a man to de-revirginate her, and renew her lapsing membership in the Naughty Girl club, Stacy optimistically hypothesizes. Why, New York is chalk full of swinging singles, over-sexed singles, pistons-at-the-ready singles: Finding a pillager of her unwanted virtue should be as easy as slipping into a pair of Manolo Blahnik sandals...but is love a requirement in order to find the perfect fit?

Valerie Frankel's The Accidental Virgin is clever, funny, and unselfconscious of its risqué, bare-it-all, down-and-dirty, tongue-in-cheek salaciousness. Perfectly tailored to the unabashed appetites of chick lit readers and devotees of "Sex and the City," its unapologetic focus is on Stacy's sexcapades, and her fumbling attempts to get lucky, and thus, eradicate her revirginated status. Oh, readers will be pink of cheek, all right -- perhaps from apoplexy, shock or offended dismay. As humorous and witty as Ms. Frankel's prose is, you see, it's still discomfortingly graphic (in word, if not deed) and not quite what this reviewer would consciously choose to read.

Morality is given the bum's rush; promiscuity is glorified; and the virtues of abstinence are only fleetingly praised (and more often than not, ridiculed). Stacy's moment of epiphany is just too late, and too ambiguous, to save the plot from plummeting into the dark, murky waters of sensationalized, and over-exploited, gratification and cheaply gained thrills. And yes, chills, because Ms. Frankel's heroine is so very desperate to ditch her hand-me-down virgin's mantle, she'll set aside all morals and standards. Open-mindedness, and an ability to appreciate trendy, boundary-pushing fiction is therefore of paramount importance to a reader's enjoyment of The Accidental Virgin. It comes on strong, tweaks a reader's sensibilities, and expertly flirts with the fine lines of decency.

Reviewed by C.L. Jeffries

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Engaging writing style but pointless, repetitive farce
Review: Stacy Temple is young, attractive, and hasn't had sex for nearly a year. In the last few days before the one-year anniversary of (unwanted) celibacy, she desperately tries to get laid. Many times. And every time, something goes wrong. Usually, the man changes his mind for some (farfetched) reason just after he pulls down his pants.

You'd better find that premise hilarious. Extremely hilarious. Because that running gag makes up about 70 percent of the book's content. If you're like me, you'll be engage for the first 50 pages or so by the writer's comic style. But soon after the book sinks because of its predictability and repetitiveness.

This is a disappointing book to say the least. The writer is engaging, but the whole thing has a very dashed-off feeling. It is readable without being interesting. All of the characters are cartoons. This is farce without cleverness, satire without purpose. If this book had come out 35 years ago, I could perhaps see it as an attempt to satirize the women's movement (some of the guys who turn her down because "you only want sex, not a relationship" seem very Alan Alda-ish from the 1970s. The book's point in 2004 eludes me completely.

And, as some others said, the ending of the book is beyond stupid. It reads as if the author had filled the requisite number of pages and could finally wrap it up -- but realized the plot was so pointless that she might as well not bother. Instead she had a contest asking people to write the most contrived, flat, and silly ending they could imagine.


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