I am definitely not allowed to call this 'chick lit'. According to author Jennifer Belle, that terms sets women back 200 years. So I won't. But it's hilariously funny and sadly moving with a unique, wry voice and centres around a neurotic 30-something single writer heroine who is obsessed with a movie director. I picked it up from the library today and I haven't regretted a word of it yet. I'll have to find Belle's previous two books now. For more, check out this interview with her. 

It talks a lot about her journey from growing up in a church with a very restrictive view of women's lives and her journey to finding a different view of the Scriptures leading her to more freedom in Christ for ministry using all the gifts God gave her.

There is also a whole chapter on telling the truth in relationships which is exactly what AP and I learned to do in the crisis days of our marriage. 'Tell the truth' has been our motto ever since.

Reading her book makes me think, "I'm not alone." It's nice to feel that.

Ruth Haley Barton has written the book I wanted to write, but I since she's done a much better job than I could ever have done, I'll just recommend it to everyone else.

I picked up this luxurious tome at my friend's house and fell in love with the photography. It's the story of Susan Southam's garden, Foxglove Spires, in Victoria. She began it on an old dairy paddock and now has a lush idyllic piece of paradise.

Unfortunately, I just don't believe the text, which paints a picture of bountiful, organic and home-made country life, lived in dirt-free, dappled sunshine.

She gives an account of turning her daughters' cubby house into a laundry. She paints it out, installs quaint cupboards and some laundry-type accessories. Now she loves to do her ironing outside on the gravel path. She uses jasmine-scented laundry spray in summer, and rose-scented spray in winter.

Nowhere does it say how many trips she took to the hardware to get the right kind of fittings for the cupboards, nor how frustrated she was when the drill bits needed replacing and she screwed in the brackets the wrong way. She doesn't write about the paint spots that ended up being tracked into the house, nor how long she had to wait for the electrician to come and install power into said cubby house. She doesn't tell us how she trips as she carries out the ironing board, and how it never quite folds up properly, nor how the iron bruises her legs when it falls out of her hands as she's carrying the board and the iron together to save time. And what happened to all the piles of dirty washing that I collect on my laundry floor? Does she have washing fairies who launder and hang it out and then bring it to her to iron on her gravel path? And where does she store the extension cord for the darn iron anyway?

Either she's not telling the whole story, or she's incredibly uptight with so many things to do (and to do properly) or she's just an incredible woman who shouldn't write books because she makes other people feel like failures.

Or am I just a bit bitter and twisted?

Look at it for the photos.

My favourite love-to-hate character is Dwight K. Shrute, a power-hungry yes-man with no sense of humour and an amazing amount of pomposity.

A quote from Dwight: "I never smile if I can help it. Showing your teeth is a sign of submission for primates. When I see someone smiling, I don't see a person. I see a chimpanzee begging for its life!"

It's the back story and the relationships between the other actors which keep me enthralled. In a way Michael and Dwight are just there to bring those out into the open more.

I can't wait to get Season 3.

Unfortunately I found that I just didn't care about any of them. It wasn't that they were badly written (one was an Alexander McCall Smith), it's just that I was uninspired.

I must be tired.

First was Cranford, a forgettable but sweet and enjoyable series based on Elizabeth Gaskell novels. The cast was great, but the plot was just a little too obvious and the premise (everything in England is changing, but the ladies of Cranford will always stay the same) a little too forced.

Next, however, was Lost in Austen. Call me behind the times, but we don't have a TV, and I missed it when it played on ABC this year. Quickflix is wonderful though, and I watched all four episodes in one Austen-loving gluttonous hit.

What a great twist on Pride and Prejudice this is. For all of us Austen-philes who crave more of Jane, but can't get it because she died such an intimely death, this is almost as good.

Lost in Austen follows the adventures of Amanda Price of Hammersmith in modern day London as she switches places with Elizabeth Bennett and tries to get the appropriate romances happening to the appropriate people, the way it's written in the book. Who could have guessed that Jane marries Mr Collins, though, or that Lydia runs away with a drunken Bingley?

Thankfully, all is arighted in the end, with the added bonus of Amanda snagging Mr Darcy and Elizabeth (who was always a modern woman in an oldfashioned world) heading back to London, where she finds herself becoming very adept with technology.

Christos Tsiolkas has won a couple of awards for this book, which centres around an Australian suburban BBQ at which an adult slaps someone else's child. When I first heard about this, I loved the idea, but the way Tsiolkas put it together left a lot to be desired for me.

• Issues

Let's see... teenage sexuality, Muslim conversion, racism, child rearing, breastfeeding, assault and child abuse, adultery, drug taking, alcoholism, selling out to popular culture, family, role of parents, multiculturalism, John Howard's policies, Aboriginality...

It's as if Tsolkias couldn't just pick one issue to deal with. He packed this book full of all Australia's most wanted. It's a book club dream, and there will be plenty to talk about, but it's too much for me.

In places it feels as if Tsolkias is writing about issues, rather than writing a story. I don't mind a novel that delves into themes and problems, but when they overcome the story, I'd prefer it to be an essay or sermon.

• Sex and drugs

When does a book get pornographic? There were at least 8 characters, and each of them had extremely well-described sex at least once. I'm not against a bit of nookie when it adds to the story, but this was over the top. It was definitely written from a man's point of view too - very phallus-centric.

And drugs. Frankly, I'm not sure that a father of two would be scoring speed at his family BBQ, and then getting through the afternoon without even his wife noticing that he was high. Every character except the Greek migrant grandfather and the Australian breastfeeding mother takes drugs. The young 18 year old heading off to a party after his end of school exams gets ruffled on the head by his mother when she realises he will be popping some pills. "You're growing up," she says. Come on! Are drugs that plentiful and easy to get that two businessmen, two high school students, a veterinarian, an Aussie blue collar painter and a screen writer can just take whatever they want? Maybe it's just Melbourne

• Language

A well-placed expletive can have a tremendous effect in a story line or for a character, but by the time you've read f&*%ing c%^$ c%$#&%$ in every second sentence, it becomes boring. Just to illustrate this paragraph, I turned at random to pages 316 and 317 in my copy of the book and counted up 6 unnecessary swear words and coarse language.

I grew up with the understanding that people swore because they didn't have a very good grasp of language. The trouble is, Tsolkias does have a good grasp of language. He is a good writer. Obviously his characters are lesser people than he is.

• Characters

The simple fact of the matter was that by the end I just didn't care about his characters. There was plenty that was ugly, dark and degenerate about each of them. There was very little that was noble, good, generous or honest. Every relationship had major flaws and was built on a flimsy foundation.

• Summary

There was hardly anything in this book that brought hope or joy. If this is Australia, and these are Australians today, then I am sorry for us. It makes me more aware that there must be something more. God's grace seems even more necessary and beautiful when I read this book.