Every Friday Night: My Year of Dating Misadventures [Hardcover]

Ritta McLaughlin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 2003

A wickedly funny and wryly wise view of life on the dating scene, filled with encounters that will resonate with every woman whose search for Prince Charming is more comedy than fairy tale.

Every Friday Night is the hilarious, first person account of the experiences of Ritta McLaughlin, a beautiful, smart, and charismatic investment banker, and her commitment to go on at least one date a week, every week, for a whole year. “The point,” she writes, “wasn’t to get me into the Guinness Book of Dubious Records for dating fifty-plus guys; it was to find my prince.” Though she didn’t end up with an engagement ring, her adventures led the way to this sparkling gem of a book.
On the rebound from a broken heart and facing her thirtieth birthday with no marriage prospects in sight, McLaughlin resolved to get a life (G.A.L.). Her journey began at a restaurant with a date her matchmaking uncle touted as “future husband material.” By the time the dinner appeared on the table, McLaughlin harbored serious suspicions that she had been set up with a man more likely to end up in an asylum than in a cozy living room. Then there was the polite, respectful, and devoted suitor whose notion of a strong relationship boiled down to a demand for the complete merger of identities. Her adventure with a classic Mr. Right-Now ended relatively well, with McLaughlin triumphantly out-gaming the gamer, but the Marauder not only took a piece of her heart in his quick getaway, he also took a stack of CDs, her portable disc player, and a hundred dollars from her wallet.
A natural storyteller, McLaughlin writes with open-hearted honesty about her own flaws, reckless actions, and crazy dates, and she shows that the quest for romance offers women a whole new perspective on themselves, and is a great way to discover the pleasures of G.A.L. without (necessarily) having a guy by their sides.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Terry McMillan meets Sex and the City in this chronicle of real-life dating disasters, penned by a 30-something African-American investment banker living in Brooklyn and working in Manhattan. She meets men in the usual places: at work, nightclubs, and community and church events, and through "fix-ups." But while McLaughlin wants to meet the right guy and has the ability to attract many men, she doesn't suffer fools gladly. She takes readers on a tour of some entertaining, blow-by-blow interactions with men who are cheap, men who lack "home training" in manners and men with other women-and in one case a man-on the side. Especially entertaining are McLaughlin's encounters with fellows like Frazier, the Wall Street hotshot she invites over for dinner. Upon arriving, he criticizes her d‚cor: "I mean, your living room looks like it's straight out of Crate & Barrel-or maybe Pottery Barn." He goes on to critique the artwork on McLaughlin's apartment walls ("too black"), her music ("shallow," with "obvious" hip-hop selections), her books ("eclectic but no crime novels") and her food ("could use some more garlic"). There are some good men in the author's life, though. One is her platonic buddy, Max; the other is her 60-year-old, thrice-married uncle, who tells her, "Folks can pretend usually for about three to six months and then the truth is gonna show up. You can't change or save anybody. You can choose to do things differently but your core is going to remain the same." Although McLaughlin's prose doesn't rise above average, her depictions of conversations with men ring true.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"Ritta brings her personal touch to the world of dating with a laugh-out-loud look inside a year of Friday nights. Don't even think about starting another weekend without reading this book."
- Terrie M. Williams, Author of A Plentiful Harvest: Creating Balance and Harmony Through the Seven Living Virtues

"An array of colorful characters and disastrous dates that prove that truth, especially on the singles scene, is stranger (and funnier) then fiction. The first time author's portraits of the toxic bachelors she encounters are sharp and witty... Uproarious, hilarious and heart breaking story of what a take-charge woman achieves when she has everything, except love... A must read book."
- New York Beacon

"Terry McMillian meets Sex in the City in this chronicle of real-life dating disasters...(McLaughlin) takes readers on a tour of some entertaining blow-by-blow interactions."
- Publisher's Weekly

"Tart and quick.. a lot of good stories."
- Kirkus Review

"EVERY FRIDAY NIGHT is an insightful, humorous, can't-put-it-down page-turner."
- Afro-American Washington Tribune

"EVERY FRIDAY NIGHT is a fresh, funny book that will strike a chord with every woman who has ever had to kiss a bunch of toads in their search to find a prince."
- The Clarion Ledger

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Doubleday; 1 edition (July 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385503806
• ISBN-13: 978-0385503808
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,127,942 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Entertaining, January 9, 2004

By 

Dorrie Wheeler - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Every Friday Night: My Year of Dating Misadventures (Hardcover)

This book was a cute, somewhat interesting read, but their were some things that annoyed me about the book, and I am not blaming the writer, I blame the editor. The book states that names were changed, characters were given non-everyday names as Olga and Kay--but there were never any real physical descriptions of the friends who were mentioned throughout the book. Also, the men that she dated were not given good physical descriptions. I feel some of this was in part by the publishers efforts to make this a more mainstream book vs. an African-American book. The dating stories were funny, but after awhile they got kind of boring. The author went on a lot of bad dates. I grew bored of one misfit guy after another and would have liked if this book took a different twist in the middle. It is entertaining.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars What a gem of a book, May 20, 2005

By 

Tina "Tina" (Montreal, Quebec) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Every Friday Night: My Year of Dating Misadventures (Hardcover)

This memoir type book written by a woman trying to date her way into a steady relationship is just wonderful.

The author is candid and takes a funny, fresh and honest look at her dating record. What is interesting is that she analyzes each one and realizes that sometimes, she is being as weird as the guy.

Each chapter starts with a cute little "my grandma always said" and some of the sayings are priceless.

Overall, this book is great and I am glad that I purchased it.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Twenty eight down, twenty four to go., July 27, 2003

By 

The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers (RAWSISTAZ.com and BlackBookReviews.net) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Every Friday Night: My Year of Dating Misadventures (Hardcover)

What would make a smart, attractive, charismatic investment
banker commit to going out on a date every Friday night for
a full year? Predictable situations often invoke unpredictable
behavior. Facing her thirtieth birthday, and suffering from a
broken heart, Ritta is depressed. After a session with her
therapist who prescribes medication for her depression, she
decides to re-write her script. So she embarks on a 52 week
dating sabbatical. This book shares the good, the bad and the
ugly side of dating through the eyes of a woman who desperately
needs a man to complete her life.

In EVERY FRIDAY NIGHT: MY YEAR OF DATING MISADVENTURES, Ms.
McLaughlin tells her story with open-hearted honesty, bravely
sharing her flaws and her reckless actions while she dates 28
different men. Her account of these outings exposes how
deceitful, insincere and dogmatic some men are. Three best
friends serve as the life preserver that saves her from
drowning in an emotional cesspool after each failed encounter.

Though this is an interesting read, at times it is repetitive
and predictable. But, to the author's credit, the escapades
are sometimes hilarious and sometimes dismal as they depict
realistic scenarios of people looking for love in too many
places.

Reviewed by aNN
of The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers