Customer Reviews

No Kidding

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

As an entertainment writer, I appreciate a good story, well told. I usually shy away from 'vanity' books - the kind that iUniverse puts out - because they lack the discipline a good editor brings to the table, but the premise of this story intrigued me. Wendy Tokunaga has told a relevant story about people I liked who must deal with problems and complications that challenge their reserves and their resourcefulness.

Audrey Mills, a Silicon Valley hi-tech employee with the soul of a film maker is living comfortably with her boyfriend of 5 years, himself a solid citizen who obviously adores Audrey. There's trouble in paradise, however, because everywhere she turns, Audrey is faced with people who want her married or pregnant, or BOTH. Her co-workers, cousins and even her best friend have babies...she feels incredible pressure to join her fellow Madonnas and produce an heir. As if she doesn't have enough to deal with, she is very attracted to a cute co-worker.

How Audrey copes with her all relationships and her future make for good storytelling and this debut is head and shoulders above what normally comes from iUniverse...I just wish these vanity publishers would invest more time in their writers and provide them with keen editors.

Maybe Tokunaga will be fortunate enough to find a committed publisher and editor for her next work...she's got a good voice and has talent to let!

Enjoy!

Although the first chapter is saccharine and fairly sickening -- the main character is beset on all sides by baybees and women with baby rabies, this book becomes very good when she grows a spine, takes charge of her own life, quits living to please everyone else, and decides what she wants out of life. This is the first novel I've ever read where there is a childfree heroine, and I for one want to see more books like this. I cheered for the woman when she dumped her emotionally shut down boyfriend; I cheered when the author had the main character and her friends talking straight about what pregnancy and childcare was really like (hard, unremitting and not always rewarding). As a childfree woman myself, this novel is priceless. I intend to pass it around to my niece, my students and anyone else I know. Although I've always been an early articulator, I was keenly interested to read about a woman who was a fence-sitter. Way to go Wendy Tokunaga! Please write more! ;)

One of the first rules in fiction writing is to create a sympathetic character, one with whom readers can identify. It may be for this reason that so few novelists have tried to create interesting, empathetic childfree women characters, thinking that the majority of readers cannot relate to such a character. However, in the novel, No Kidding by Wendy Tokunaga, not only do we have a sympathetic childfree character with whom it is easy to relate, but an interesting, intelligent, thoughtful, compassionate, caring female protagonist.

In the tradition of the best fiction, there are several crises, and each one creates more pressure and problems for Audrey until she has resolved them all in due course of the novel. Using emails, old postal letters, shower invitations and the like are a unique way of moving the story along too. And yes, the story has a happy ending . . . just not an expected one, or a traditional one.

All in all, one of the best novels I've read in some time. I don't know why there aren't more such positive, empathetic childfree characters in fiction. . . but I do think there will be in the future as authors begin to show others that the childfree are not stereotypical shrews or selfish, self-centered, uncaring people. No Kidding is a good example in that direction, and I highly recommend it, whether you are childfree or not.

No kidding is the journey through the life of Audrey, a typical women in her mid thirties who simply does not want to have kids. Is that so bad?

Both my wife and I have read this book and there was so much we could relate to. The coincidences with our own lives were numerous and scarey. Something that I think all child-free people will be able to relate to.

For those of you that aren't child-free this is simply an enjoyable story, set in a beautiful city with interesting and all too familiar characters! Who knows, you may even get an insight into the lives of some of your friends.

We laughed, we cried and we cringed along with Audrey. I think you'll enjoy this book too!

At last, a novel in which the heroine has genuine "issues," specifically: whether to marry, whom to marry, whether to have a baby. Tokunaga has written a riveting story which certainly makes the reader think. She begins her tale by rejecting the notion, out of hand, that only by bearing children can a woman be fulfilled.

Along the way to resolving this question--if, in fact, there can be any resolution--Tokunaga exhibits an impressive range of expertise, from old movies to film preservation, from computers and Silicon Valley to wine tastings. Her heroine is an engaging one and the characters of the supporting cast are better developed than in the typical woman's fiction.

If there's one significant difference here from other women's fiction, it was the failure to display exactly why this particular heroine was so lovable that men practically dropped at her feet. Yet that answer really has no impact on the more important issues addressed in the book.

NO KIDDING is a fascinating story, and the only flaw was grammatical. She has persistent problems with the past tense and with the proper use of subject or object in a sentence. (Who, whom, I, me.) I hope that Ms. Tokunaga writes many more novels, and I hope that she finds a capable editor before her next work is published; her storytelling skills deserve better.

NO KIDDING addresses some very important issues which almost always are otherwise ignored, and it does so in a lively style which draws in the reader.

Tokunaga creates a character in Audrey who is realistic, at times frustratingly so, fraught as she is with impulsiveness and uncertainty; all the insecurities which torment human interaction. The author's conversational tone imparts to readers the sense of listening while a troubled friend unfolds layers of a story composed of decades of interwoven influences.

We are invited to lean in and listen as Audrey confesses: Lylah's camera-ready childhood has warped her sense of individualism. Her sister Pier's grand overseas adventure has unsettled her own career choices. Doug's demeaning--if well-meaning--behavior has driven her into the arms of another man, and Aldo gives her emotional and sexual attention that changes her life and empowers her choices.

I thoroughly enjoyed this hilarious look at one woman's fight with her biological clock. Even though I thought this book was funny, there were also some insightful points that got me to thinking!

Audrey Mills is 35, has been living with Doug for seven years now and her former child actress mother is pushing her to get married and have children. Audrey doesn't know what she wants to do with her life but she knows it's not that! Her older sister Pier has escaped by going to Kenya.

Then Audrey meets Aldo, a man who is not only handsome but he's also smart and fun to be with. They start going to lunch together and one thing leads to another but should she throw it all away for a chance at happiness?

I loved the zany characters in this fun book and hope to see more of Wendy Tokunaga's work.

Many men and women spend months and years deciding whether to have children, but we rarely see this process represented in fiction. Finally, Wendy Tokunaga has written about this very personal and contemporary subject in a compelling way. Audrey is the protagonist who battles the status quo, but is all the while questioning her own needs and motivations. She can't look to her friends, to history or family role models for guidance on this subject; it has been so few years that women truly had this choice--biologically or socioeconomically. We follow her through her decision process as she faces some truths about herself and the life she wants to lead. She is conflicted but she is free thinking, independent and very clear on the impact this decision will make on her life. Why are there so few fictional characters like Audrey? According to Tokunaga, Audrey is one of many. 'Choice' is a process with few markers deserving of a balanced, uncritical treatment.

Thirty-five year old Audrey Mills and her live-in boyfriend, Doug, were thought to be taking a long time to get married. All her friends and co-workers were married and having babies. It seemed Audrey had to go to a baby shower weekly! Her mother was constantly pressing her about getting married and giving her some grandchildren. Even Doug was thinking babies! He wanted to marry soon, move to the suburbs with a perfect house full of kids. No one understood that Audrey just did not WANT to have any children! She felt like screaming!

Enter Aldo Puccetti, a new co-worker. Work brought them together and lunch conversations showed that they had much in common. Audrey's whole life changed when she left Doug for Aldo. They began living together and seemed perfect for each other. But Aldo's ex-fiancé was not so easy to get rid of!

*** I liked how the ending was done, very true to life. Many readers will see themselves in this novel. A realistic and modern day tale of romance in today's high tech world. Good reading here! ***

Ms. Tokunaga has a knack for setting, and does an excellent job of drawing in the reader with her quaint and detailed descriptions of various Bay Area attractions, sights and landmarks. Her characterizations are equally engaging and well delineated, tapping into the desires, needs and disillusionment of modern day singles and couples with much insight and aplomb. I especially sympathized with Audrey and identified with her particular plight of being 'the odd woman out'. I think any single woman who has ever remotely heard her own biological clock ticking or experienced the pressures of well-meaning but intrusive family and friends would sympathize with Audrey.

NO KIDDING effectively portrays the theme of indecisive, discontented and pampered thirtysomethings trying to find their way. Overall, an entertaining and competently done first novel that showed the negative consequences of letting family and friends influence important life decisions instead of following one's own heart.