Advanced
Error loading page.
Try refreshing the page. If that doesn't work, there may be a network issue, and you can use our self test page to see what's preventing the page from loading.
Learn more about possible network issues or contact support for more help.
Title details for Girls in White Dresses by Jennifer Close - Available

Girls in White Dresses

by Jennifer Close
Emily Janice Card
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
Borrow Listen to a sample Listen to a sample
1 of 1 copy available
Wickedly hilarious and utterly recognizable, Girls in White Dresses tells the story of three women grappling with heartbreak and career change, family pressure and new love—all while suffering through an endless round of weddings and bridal showers.
Isabella, Mary, and Lauren feel like everyone they know is getting married. On Sunday after Sunday, at bridal shower after bridal shower, they coo over toasters, collect ribbons and wrapping paper, eat minuscule sandwiches and doll-sized cakes. They wear pastel dresses and drink champagne by the case, but amid the celebration these women have their own lives to contend with: Isabella is working at a mailing-list company, dizzy with the mixed signals of a boss who claims she’s on a diet but has Isabella file all morning if she forgets to bring her a chocolate muffin. Mary thinks she might cry with happiness when she finally meets a nice guy who loves his mother, only to realize he’ll never love Mary quite as much. And Lauren, a waitress at a Midtown bar, swears up and down she won’t fall for the sleazy bartender—a promise that his dirty blond curls and perfect vodka sodas make hard to keep.
With a wry sense of humor, Jennifer Close brings us through those thrilling, bewildering, what-on-earth-am-I-going-to-do-with-my-life years of early adulthood. These are the years when everyone else seems to have a plan, a great job, and an appropriate boyfriend, while Isabella has a blind date with a gay man, Mary has a crush on her boss, and Lauren has a goldfish named Willard. Through boozy family holidays and disastrous ski vacations, relationships lost to politics and relationships found in pet stores, Girls in White Dresses pulls us deep inside the circle of these friends, perfectly capturing the wild frustrations and soaring joys of modern life.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    August 9, 2011

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9780307939357
      • File size: 232265 KB
      • Duration: 08:03:53

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Narrator Emily Janice Card brings a fresh perspective to this series of vignettes about a group of friends who are coping with the uncertainties of life after college. Isabella, Mary, and Lauren find that their adult lives are not living up to their expectations as they support each other through mediocre dates, bar crawls, and career disappointments. As the book progresses, minor characters are brought in, and the interlocking stories shed light on the women's relationships. Card's narration adds an appealing immediacy to the thinly drawn characters. She also heightens the book's sly humor with a lighthearted tone, and her girl-next-door delivery helps the listener engage with the characters. A.M.R. (c) AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      May 30, 2011
      Artfully spare prose adds a literary tinge to the chick lit staplesânavigating relationships, bridesmaid duties, disappointing first jobsâexplored in Close's debut collection. At their weakest, the stories owe too much to their predecessors: "The Showers," in which the recurring characters travel to a suburban bridal shower, is essentially a retelling of a snappier Sex and the City episode, and Isabella's boss in "Blind" has the dark shades of The Devil Wears Prada. The standout moments come in "The Peahens," when Abby reveals her unusual family and her struggle to fit in (she "studied hard, taking notes on the silver link bracelets all the girls wore"), and the sharp "Hope," when Shannon takes a backseat to her boyfriend's naïve political passion for "the Candidate" of a presidential campaign. Occasionally funny (as when Isabella refers to her dinner dates as "parallel eating"), but without the risk taking of The Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing or the deeply explored emotion of Prep, these stories will resonate with readers in the throes of the quarter-life churn who can see themselves in the cast.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

Loading