THE QUALITY OF LIFE REPORT by Meghan Daum
When NYC lifestyle reporter Lucinda Trout travels to the midwest to produce a research piece on crystal-meth addicted housewives, she leaves behind a miniscule apartment and a DOA love life in search of what she deems The Quality of Life Report.
Her series of Little House on the Prairie meets Sex and the City-esque productions prove not only popular to her fellow New Yorkers but quickly turn her into something else as well. The never maudlin, ultimately determined Lucinda finds herself living in a barn with a local river-bathing, bearded, eccentric semi-mountain man and his children and, gasp, liking it.
With impeccable comic timing and incorrigable social criticism, QUALITY OF LIFE REPORT, pokes fun without harm and allows every reader to move with Lucinda to Prarie City and in short, convinces readers and viewwers to drink the kool-aid. When it comes to light that PC'ers have their own set of problems and issues, just like those in NYC, Lucinda is able to see them for who they are, and she for her true self. Whereas when she arrived, she believed some actions and reactions just didnt count, much like a trip to Vegas. The yankee smarty-pants gets a hard and fast lesson in lovin' leavin' and farm animals.
OVERALL Somewhat chick-lit-ish, QUALITY OF LIFE, is LOL funny and simultaneously satistfying. We all learn a lesson(s) , if anything, about ourselves while having a good laugh as well and cheering for our heroine at the end.

WATER FOR ELEPHANTS by Sara Guen
I dont remember where I had first heard about Water for Elephants. Perhaps it was while perusing my latest issue of Jane magazine; or the best seller list on nytimes.com; or even a passing mention on my Borders books emailed newsletter but it was on my list nonetheeless when headed to the library during the most recent venture to grab reading material for a work-related trip to Reno, NV (more on that later).

WATER FOR ELEPHANTS is told through simultaneous but seamless present day and flashback dialogue. Telling the Depression-era story of the Jacob Jankowski, a veterinary college near-graduate who drops out during his finals following the death of his parents, WATER FOR ELEPHANTS, is vibrant and colorful in depictions and descriptions. Doing what many of us mischievously say as children, Jacob does - he runs away and joins the circus. He moves both effortlessly and with difficulty through the social caste system of the circus, making friends and enemies of the upper and lower echelon, mingling with each and every "character" within the circus. Guen depicts each color, sound, smell, touch, and sighs of the circus, from setting up the tents to running for the train as it moves to the next town, with startling eloquence and beauty. Each character, normally seen as freaks or the stereotypical circus folk, becomes the star of their own show, despite their existence in a second-rate circus in its own continuous quest for greatness trailing ever so many steps behind the star Ringling Bros show.
WATER FOR ELEPHANTS is simplistic complex and unbelievably colorful, with romance, drama, horror, angst, action and the readers involvement within each emotion. Although mentioned on the jacket as a love story, I felt that it was less of a love story and more of a human interest piece with somewhat of a dark-sided love story drifting along side the main plot; towards the middle and end of the piece, the love story raises its head and up and begins running feverishly towards the end keeping up with the previous pace of the both.

OVERALL: I simply cannot say enough about WATER FOR ELEPHANTS. I hadnt read any of Guen's other acclaimed works but look forward to picking them up.