Rating: 
Summary: Loved It!
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed this book and it was a lot more than I expected. For some reason, I thought Girl Talk would be a light, fluffy humorous look at mother-daughter relationships, but it's not; Girl Talk is a look back on a pivotal summer, what she calls the summer that wasn't, in a young girl's life. The Girl Talk she has with her mother is not superficial, but rather covers the truth which is so often hidden between mothers and daughters. The novel opens in the present, with Lissy (the young woman) 30 and pregnant with her married ex-lover's child. She reflects back on that summer fifteen years ago, when she and her mother flee their New Hampshire town for her mom's hometown of Bayonne, New Jersey in the hopes that it provides some guidance for what to do now. She tells us the stories of her mother's life that her mother told her, maybe they will provide her with an answer. All three stories, Lissy's current story, her mother's and their joint story fifteen years ago, are told in wonderful "girl talk", full of witty, wise and wisecracking observations. In Lissy's summer, fifteen years ago, girl talk with her mother helps her to learn that her mother is human, that her mother had a life before. This novel reminded me very much of three other novels that I love: Anywhere but Here, Welcome to my Planet and Otherwise Engaged. Lissy's voice is wise beyond her years, sarcastic and observant. Enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: Girl Talk
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed it. The characters are so memorable. I felt immersed in their lives. Their stories touched me; I felt so curious about them. I particulary liked the mother legacy impact that threaded through the generations, Grandmom Verbitski to Dotty and than Dotty to Lissy. I was deeply touched by their connections and definitely related to it. I marvel at how J. Baggott breathed such uniqueness into even the minor characters. (The Church Fiske character is inspired, intriguing, humorous and a little tragic.) As well as how she adeptly traveled back and forth in time sequence, it worked so smoothely and enhanced the outcome of Lissy's decision and resolve at the end. I liked the declaring of one's own truth in what one takes to be their reality. An engrossing read. I look forward to her next novel.
Rating: 
Summary: Summer that wasn't...
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. Baggott showed great imagination and tenderness between mother and daughter. This book is a very different kind of coming of age novel, not the normal conflicts and relationships. And in fact, it's remarkable that in the Lissy's coming of age, she never really does come of age, just some funny and endearing enlightenments. Very different, very thought-provoking, and, best of all, very entertaining.
Rating:
Summary: Impressive Debut
Review: Reading GIRL TALK is something like reading THE CHEERLEADER by Jill McCorkle, not that Julianna Baggott is a voice out of the New South (in fact, she is positioned to pioneer the New Northeast tradition). THE CHEERLEADER was McCorkle's first novel, very decent, but then she published JULY 7th which did cartwheels around that first novel. You can tell Baggott is ready to do cartwheels around GIRL TALK in her next novel, but it isn't published yet. So, for the meantime, we have GIRL TALK, which is only a tad flawed. GIRL TALK bounces between the present and her protagonist's and her protagonist's mother's pasts. The narrator, a thirty year-old who works in advertising in New York finds herself pregnant by a married man who has dumped her. Obviously, a path of choices led her to this predicament and as she makes meaning out of it, she revisits the turning points in hers and the lives of her mother and the cast of characters who attend them. Most important is her fifteenth summer, when her father, in a rare lapse of responsibility, leaves to have an affair and she and her mother take a road trip from the comfortable New England doctor's house to her mother's origins in the Catholic working class neighborhoods of Bayonne, New Jersey. There are some inspired and often comic characters and scenes that pepper GIRL TALK. My favorite is a very misguided intervention that returns as a surprising and logical metaphor at the end of the story. The flaw that marks this as a first novel is a slight imbalance: in some passages there is too much telling rather than showing. There is no constant open faucet of anger or cultural tradition (think New South) to empower the comedy fully, but then the intent of the story is to understand, not blow up. It is a bit languid at times, but again, there are those inspired sections that do make it worthwhile.
Rating:
Summary: Well worth the read! Loving the poet-turned-novelist trend
Review: After stumbling across her debut poetry release, This Country of Mothers, my enthusiasm for Julianna Baggott's budding career led me to her first novel release, Girl Talk. I must say, there are few people in my closest group of friends who don't already own and love this piece of writing. Exercising a clever wit that is refreshing and edgy, Baggott boasts a lyrical prowess in Girl Talk that guarantees incredible potential in fictional writing in combination with her insightful, crafted poetry. I look forward to her next novel and/or poetry release!
Rating:
Summary: disagreeing with other reviewers
Review: I couldn't disagree more with the other reviewers. Girl Talk happens for those with a sharp wit and keen sense of humor. If you are a reviewer often disappointed by books, you're probably reading more book reviews than books. Try making up your own mind instead of just disagreeing with professional critics.
Rating: 
Summary: A Poorly-Edited Disappointment with Much Promise
Review: I gave Girl Talk a whirl, having heard about it here and there, and I must say that I was disappointed. Not because I had had particularly high expectations of the novel, because I hadn't. I was disappointed simply because I felt that Girl Talk COULD have been great. It had all the right elements -- interesting characters, an intriguing plot. But for whatever reason, people involved in the book's publication obviously didn't do their jobs as well as they should have. First of all, and I know that this is a minor gripe, there are a few words of Polish sprinkled throughout the novel. Great, I think, throwing those in there will make the grandmother seem more real, better fleshed out. The problem, however, is that I speak Polish, and the few words thrown into the book were, well, NOT. Almost every Polish word in the book was misspelt, and strange accents were thrown in where they didn't belong. But ok, I know very few people are going to notice that. However, there were a few more editing gaffes. For example, there is a character in the book with a prosthetic leg. Lissy uses the exact same metaphor to describe the book twice in the novel -- it's like a lover waiting for her. I'm almost certain that the author did not mean to repeat herself -- she simply had the same good idea twice and no one caught it. So. I'll most likely read Ms. Baggott's next attempt, if only to see if she lives up to her promise. As for this book, it's largely skip-able. I'd recommend Amy and Isbaelle for a mother-daughter book, or My Year of Meats perhaps.
Rating: 
Summary: argh!
Review: this is a book where NOTHING HAPPENS. it's a complete waste of money. if you want a good read, get "Getting Over It" by Anna Maxted, but don't buy this.
Rating:
Summary: "The Book" for females in late twenties
Review: I came across this book while browsing a library and am so glad that I did! It evoked so many memories of the pains and pleasures associated with coming of age in the eighties and nineties! Some reviews of this books, I've noted, have criticized the characters as dysfunctional, but I found them to be true to life, likeable, and honest. The book is not bogged down with attempts at being too politically correct, which allows it to really get to your heart. I would recommend this to any young woman who enjoys a return to 80's and 90's nostalgia.
Rating:
Summary: It's okay!
Review: I, too, was expecting more from this book after reading the rave reviews it was given... but it didn't live up to five star quality. It was an interesting read, and read fast so it was mildly enjoyable. The author gave great depths to Dotty and Lissy's characters which explained some of their actions and feelings. The book is basically a recap of the summer that 15 year old Lissy's father ran off with a secretary. That summer, her mother Dotty reveals to Lissy the secret of her life. Through learning these secrets, Lissy and the reader can see why her mother is the way she is and why the father might have left. Lissy at the age of 30 now reflects on the drama of that summer and how it's affected her life and made her repeat some of the smae mistakes her mother had. Although you can see how and why Lissy and Dotty clung to men that weren't "available" you never really know what Lissy's true feelings were. She seems emotionally blase about many things in life... It seems as if she doesn't have many strong opinions either way, but continues to let this one summer of truth to shape her life. The book was just a plain old okay... I didn't hate it, and I didn't love it.
|
