I'm Not Julia Roberts [Hardcover]

Laura Ruby (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2, 2007

Does every second wife look like Julia Roberts? Lu Kleincertainly doesn't, and her life is anything but glamorous. When she marrieda man with children, Lu had no idea that she was also marrying his shrewishex-wife, Beatrix. And Beatrix had no idea that making a new home with hersecond husband would mean welcoming her wicked teenage stepdaughter, Liv.And Liv's mother Roxie had no idea that so many new and exciting boyfriendscould make her long for the stable life she and her ex had too eagerly leftbehind.In this tightly interconnected collection of ten short stories, authorLaura Ruby chronicles the progress of Lu, Beatrix, Roxie and their varioussteps and exes as they take the perilous plunge into the maelstrom of theso-called "blended family." Both ruefully funny and wickedly insightful,I'M NOT JULIA ROBERTS offers finely-observed, honest and affecting takes onkids, stepkids, divorce, remarriage...and the movie Stepmom.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Ruby, whose third YA novel Good Girls is due this fall, starts off with a fresh, sardonic wit in this linked collection of divorce stories, but the unnerving stepchildren, sordid affairs and malevolent exes soon begin to blur. Suburban, self-absorbed Lu ("Lupe Klein, neither Hispanic nor Jewish") never expected to play mother to Ward Harrison's three complicated sons or have to deal with his ex-wife, Beatrix. While Beatrix is in a state of blind marital bliss with her new husband, Alan, she is not ready for Alan's mean-spirited, teenage daughter, Liv. Liv's mother, Roxie, not yet remarried but dating her friend Moira's unscrupulous ex-, Tate, is desperately trying to figure out how to balance her relationship with Tate while maintaining her bond with Liv. There are five couples in all, including Moira and second husband Ben, and Tate's sister Glynn (divorced from Derek) and her second husband, George—plus assorted children. A chapter moving backward in time and composed of e-mails, instant messages and snail mail detailing their entanglements is more disorienting than anything else. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

With the same kind of emotional understatement that made Shari Goldhagen's Family and Other Accidents (2006) so riveting, Ruby tells the interconnected stories of a group of families trying to cope with life in the wake of divorce. Riffing on the idyllic view of blended families presented in the movie Stepmom, starring Julia Roberts, Ruby offers a more rueful, realistic, way-funnier version as bitter ex-wives, angry teenagers, and beleaguered second wives attempt to wade through daily negotiations involving clashing schedules and wounded feelings. Among them is droll career woman Lu, who didn't have a clue when she fell in love with handsome Ward Klein and his three cute toddlers. Years later she must contend with hulking teens who speak in monosyllables and address her as Loopy. Meanwhile, Ward's ex-wife, Beatrix, remarried to a cheerful man whose high energy level matches her own, must also learn to scale back her expectations in the face of his adolescent daughter's contempt. YA novelist Ruby captures both warring emotions and fleeting moments of connection in this smart take on fractured families. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing; 1ST edition (January 2, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446578746
• ISBN-13: 978-0446578745
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,003,810 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Laura Ruby is the author of books for adults, teens and children. Her titles include the Edgar-nominated tween mystery LILY'S GHOSTS (now updated for 2011), the children's fantasy THE WALL AND THE WING (3/06) and a sequel, THE CHAOS KING (5/07) all published by Harpercollins. She writes for older teens as well, and her debut young adult novel, GOOD GIRLS (9/06), also from Harpercollins, was a Book Sense Pick for fall 2006 and an ALA Quick Pick for 2007. She followed this with the teen novels PLAY ME (2008) and BAD APPLE (2009).

Her short fiction for adults has appeared in various literary magazines, including Other Voices and The Florida Review. A collection of these stories, I'M NOT JULIA ROBERTS, was published by Warner Books in January 2007. Called "hilarious and heart-wrenching" by People and "a knowing look at the costs and rewards of remaking a family," by the Miami Herald, the book was also featured in Redbook, Working Mother, and USA Today, among others.

Raised in the wilds of suburban New Jersey, Laura Ruby now lives in the Chicago area with her husband and two cats that serve as creative advisors.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wicked look inside blended families, January 22, 2007

By 

L. Blumenthal "lynn" (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: I'm Not Julia Roberts (Hardcover)

As a member of a blended family myself, I was rolling with laughter over Laura Ruby's descriptions of the hopelessly dysfunctional kin in "I'm Not Julia Roberts." The role of the step-parent is first and foremost on her mind, but the bewildered state of the divorced biological parent also gets a moment on the stage. Even the evil ex-wife with control issues gets her chance to express her view of the whole extended-family disaster.

The writing may be a bit savage at times, and some readers may quail at the descriptions of the hopelessly lost children. But the truth is that kids are not always adaptable to change and their behavior can be alienating at best. Most do come around, however, and there is a hint in this book that change is possible.

My only beef is the family tree at the beginning of the book. I found myself hopelessly lost as to the inter-relationships of the characters and found that the tree wasn't helping very much. I'm not sure what sort of device would work better, however.

All in all, a witty and biting look at the state of families today. It's a must for anyone who's been divorced, remarried, and dealing with children.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Many POV on blended families, January 17, 2007

By 

Armchair Interviews (Minneapolis, MN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: I'm Not Julia Roberts (Hardcover)

This is not our mother's novel, and in spite of the aproned figure on the cover, this is not the story of June Cleaver, either. I'm Not Julia Roberts is a collection of interwoven stories chronicling the blended family.

The title alludes to Julia Roberts' character in the movie Stepmom. She is the unseen foil to Lu Klein, one of the stepmothers in this collection. Lu, along with her husband's ex-wife Beatrix, and Beatrix's husband's ex-wife, Roxie, are just a few of the women we meet in this oddly interconnected world.

If not for the "family tree" diagram in the front of the book, I might have gotten hopelessly lost! It was immensely helpful, not only for the marriages current and broken, but also for the children's names and their interconnections.

Laura Ruby's writing style is descriptive, yet straightforward. She tells the story in a circular rather than linear fashion--and in the case of one chapter, through emails and notes, entirely backwards. Occasionally her imagery is so poignant, so true, it made me stop reading and ponder.

One of the strengths of the book is that each story has a different point of view. By the end of the book, we've seen not only the main characters' own points of view, we've also seen these characters' views of each other. This adds a touch of reality because we get to see everyone's side of the story--wives, husbands, and children.

Overall, I'd recommend this book to those who are from intact families, because it gives the reader a glimpse into the world of blended families and the balancing acts therein. I also recommend this book to those in blended families, for they will understand even more of the nuances and subtexts, and perhaps even smile in recognition.

Armchair Interviews says: Unique view of blended families.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Stay Away!, March 9, 2011

By 

Julie W. "jujubean122" (Virginia, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: I'm Not Julia Roberts (Hardcover)

I really can't write up a summary of "I'm Not Julia Roberts." Why? Because this book failed to have any kind of plot line.

Ok. I get that this book was supposed to be sarcastic. I get that the humor was supposed to have a dry sort of character to it. It's definitely not supposed to be the "laugh out loud feel good book of the year." However, instead of a humorous take on what being a step-parent/second wife can be, all I got was a mass of convoluted (and unrealistic) semi-related characters who all whined, complained, and moaned either about their exes, their exes new spouses, or their step children.

That was the entire story. Lu complains about Beatrix, Beatrix complains about Ward, Ward complains about Beatrix, Alan complains about Ward, and a whole mass of other less important characters who made brief appearances to farther complicate the mix of these two couples. Add in about 6 or 7 random kids and you have a huge crockpot meal that someone shoved all the contents of their veggie drawer into, left the mass on the counter for 10 hours, yet forgot to hit cook.

Basically at the end of the book I was left with the same remnants of that crockpot meal: a mess of goo.

Wish I could have given it zero stars. In fact, the only reason I did NOT put this book down was because it was the only book I had for an 8 hour day of test proctoring.