Book Review: My Horizontal Life by Chelsea Handler

I've been meaning to review Chelsea Handler's My Horizontal Life for awhile, but I've been dragging my feet here at the ol' Punnery. My apologies. I'll strive to get back on track. The list of books that I need to review is starting to get long and unwieldy and I'm afraid I might just give up on some of them soon enough. But anyway! Onto the book review:

My Horizontal Life is a collection of memories from Chelsea Handler's life growing up as a young, hot sex-kitten and the sort of antics that I could only dream of experiencing, given that I was never a hot sex kitten, not even in my wildest dreams. So to say that My Horizontal Life is my way of living vicariously through the glory days of some blonde skinny chick is a pretty good sum up.

The best part about the book is that it's actually good. Handler's funny as hell in a way that only fearless women can be. Her good looks have allowed her to get away with essentially murder, and she knows it, and she rolls with it. She recounts some of her most embarrassing morning-afters (the ones that we've all had but are hesitant to admit to). Midgets, male strippers, black guys, rich guys, weirdos, Chels has done 'em all.

Plus, she's funny. You can't hate a girl who willingly admits she has a drinking problem and it's led to some incredibly awkward situations in bed. All you can do is laugh and thank God it wasn't you. Unfortunately, I don't think her brand of humour really translates well to TV (thus, I've never been able to get through an entire episode of the Chelsea Handler Show), but I'll keep reading her books if she's willing to keep embarrassing herself further.

Rating: 3/5 stars

Bad Sex Award Proves Literary Heavy Weights Can't Handle Sexytimes

Paulo Coehlo, John Updike, and Simon Montefiore all have something in common—they should leave the love scenes for the professionals. All three have been shortlisted for the Literary Review Bad Sex in Fiction Award.

As a woman who has read a lot of sexy books and written some exceptionally distasteful sex scenes in her time (read on for an explanation), I am not surprised that these illustrious literary heavey-weights have been brought down a notch. It's not easy writing sex. There's a fine balance between just enough exposition and the purple prose that keeps the reader wanting more.

Plus, is sex really something a novel needs anyway? Obviously if the literature has been published, and it hasn't been cut in the rigorous editorial process, one can assume that some one made the executive decision to keep it. Sex sells, right? So maybe if we keep Coehlo's love scene (set upon a park footpath), we'll sell a few more copies. What say you, Coehlo?

"At last, she could no longer control the world around her," Coelho continues, "her five senses seemed to break free and she wasn't strong enough to hold on to them. As if struck by a sacred bolt of lightning, she unleashed them, and the world, the seagulls, the taste of salt, the hard earth, the smell of the sea, the clouds, all disappeared, and in their place appeared a vast gold light, which grew and grew until it touched the most distant star in the galaxy."

If I had read this in context, I still would have snorted out laughing. Then rolled my eyes, because never have I emitted "a vast gold light." But then, I'm probably too artless for the type of sex Mr. Coehlo composes. For the longest time, my literary sex life was rooted in fanfiction written by and for teenagers like me, a world full of dominant males and eager to please sexual novices. Heck, I even wrote some of that garbage myself. And no, you cannot see it.

And nowadays I've got a pile of Harlequins a meter high, waiting to be devoured in between Don Quixote and On the Road.

I'm not saying that sex should stay in genre fiction. Heaven knows there are great examples of good sex in literary novels (The Time Traveller's Wife, anyone?) But it's awfully difficult to write a good love scene.

Image source: Stewf