Customer Reviews

Momzillas: It's a jungle out there on Park Avenue, baby!

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I enjoyed reading this book. What a fun escape it brings from the daily grind of cooking, cleaning, and changing diapers! No, Momzillas is not a literary masterpiece, but it IS a light, fun book that I believe fans of chick lit and "mommy lit" will love to read.

The main character is Hannah, who has just moved to New York with investment banker husband and two-year-old daughter, Violet. Hannah is immediately thrown into a world with super-competitive and not so friendly "momzillas" and forced to see her disapproving, socialite mother-in-law far too often. Lonely for her old friends and missing her husband who is having to work way too much, Hannah gets caught up in the ways of the other moms and finds herself crazily scheduling appointments at the best pre-pre-preschool and buying $250 designer baby blouses.

It is fun to see Hannah come full circle and re-discover what really matters. Everything comes together in the end and even the meanest momzilla of all gets what's coming to her. Even if you do not have kids, I think you will enjoy reading about New York City and its silly, stylish, over the top mommies.

I have now read the full Jill Kargman collection - Superb! Perfect mix of sassy and sultery New York City Society Life coupled with intelligent and biting prose. Can't wait for the next one. What am I going to read now?? Hope there is an NYC mom in the early years coming up.

I enjoy chick-lit books, and I think this book would fall pretty safely into this category. The story of a young mother moving to NY and encountering the elite echelon of NY society and all their snobby ways when it comes to children and raising children. How much of it is true to life? Don't know and wouldn't want to know people like this in real life, but its entertaining enough to keep reading about them on paper!

I did not expect any more than a fun, quick read with this book - and so for me it delivered exactly what I wanted. And I recommend it for those who are looking for just an amusing, no brainer read.

First, I'm a diehard Kargman-ite, a true devotee to the witty way in which she sees the world and its endless cast of characters. Second, Momzillas is no exception to Kargman's rules for making a great, entertaining and fun weekend read. She effortlessly tromps through NYC's Upper East Side, taking no prisoners as she colorfully lambasts the Momzillas who inhabit the place - all the while juxtaposing these type-A-gone-bezerk women with her title character Hannah, the gal who just wants to knock the mom thing down a pace or two, but feels her desire to do so might be a reflection of her unworthiness as a mom. While the NYC location is always key to Kargman's books, one need not know NYC to relate - as we all know - Momzillas exist everywhere. Every mom can relate - not only with the annoyance of the Momzilla, but also with the frighteningly easy downslope we must strive to avoid before becoming one ourselves. Whether we moms admit it or not, we all struggle with the same voice in our heads that is constantly asking, "Am I doing enough for (insert kid's name here)." Kargman, through Hannah's twisted journey to the edge of bitchville and back, ultimately reinforces our knowledge that a kid doesn't have to have it all to have it all.

I think I could write a book about how awful this book was. I love a good summer chick lit read-I know they are usually pretty formulaic-the sweet but clueless love interest, the evil, bitchy arch villian, the designer name dropping, but this book was below par, even for chick lit standards.

To begin with, the writing was terrible, as if the author decided to throw in every annoying phrase (the overuse of the word "smacks" for dollar bills is enough to drive even the most patient reader up the wall) and stereotype she knew, and then pepper the whole mess with scenarios directly out of this obscure little show called Sex and The City, thinking no one would notice. (A single friend calls the main character worried that she will die in her apartment and her cat will eat her. She couldn't even change it to a dog? C'mon!)

But the real killer was this: the main character, whom I assume we were supposed to be sympathetic with, is one of the most whiney, annoying, pathetic characters ever to monologue her way through the chick lit genre, or any genre, for that matter. With the kind of self involvement that makes Meredith Grey seem like she doesn't have a care in the world, the character spends what must have amounted to fictional hours upon hours worrying what other people thought of her, only to then condemn those same women for being so caught up in what other people think. She spends more time reacting to the dynamic, Type A "Momzillas" than taking a proactive role in, well, anything.

I wish she were a real person, if only so I could slap her and tell her to be a woman and shake it off. The only time she isn't complaining about the Momzillas that we are supposed to hate because they get dressed, excercise, enroll their children in playgroups and fret about their futures, is to congratulate herself for letting her daughter watch excessive amounts of television and feed her the most impure, saturated, sweetened foodstuff known to mankind, all while she contemplates cheating on her husband because he just "isn't there for her." Some mom.

Save your money.