The Dirty Book Club ⭐⭐⭐

The Dirty Book Club by Lisi Harrison

Cover Wars
Paperback
Hardcover - Gallery Books

Paperback - Bulgarian

Hardcover - Russian
The main hardcover (finger on lip) is my least favorite. I like the Russian cover with the four members of the DBC with their noses in the books. I'd probably pick the brown paper bag because they DID put other covers over their taboo books. Plus back in the day we *DID* use paper bags as book covers for our schoolbooks so I like the nostalgia effect. 

G👀dreads

...comes a novel about the importance of friendship, and, of course, the pleasure of a dirty book.
M.J. Stark’s life is picture-perfect—she has her dream job as a magazine editor, a sexy doctor boyfriend, and a glamorous life in New York City. But behind her success, there is a debilitating sense of loneliness. So when her boss betrays her and her boyfriend offers her a completely new life in California, she trades her cashmere for caftans and gives it a try. Once there, M.J. is left to fend for herself in a small beach town, with only the company of her elderly neighbor, Gloria, and an ocean that won’t shut up.

One afternoon, M.J. discovers that Gloria has suddenly moved to Paris with her friends to honor a fifty-year-old pact. And in lieu of a goodbye, she’s left a mysterious invitation to a secret club—one that only reads erotic books. Curious, M.J. accepts and meets the three other hand-selected club members. As they bond over naughty bestsellers and the shocking letters they inherited from the original club members, the four strangers start to divulge the intimate details of their own lives… and as they open up, they learn that friendship might just be the key to rewriting their own stories: all they needed was to find each other first.

Genre: Fiction, Chick Lit, Books About Books

The How/Why: This auto-populated when I was looking up another book on Libby. When you enter a title, if it's not in the library it brings up other books with similar titles. I was checking for another [don't remember] Book Club title and when it popped up The Dirty Book Club it peeked my interest!  It only has 3.48 stars on GR but one reviewer said "A delightful, humorous, and even spicy look at women’s relationships today". Another said "This book read like Ya-Ya Sisterhood..." I didn't read the reviews, just the first line as I scrolled down. Humor, spicy, sisterhood, okay, we shall see. 

Day 2: The first part was Ya-Ya-esq but the second half, not so much. 

⭐⭐⭐

🎉 Overall Enjoyment? 🎉🎉🎉

🎣 Did it grab and keep my attention? 🎣🎣🎣

🗣️Would I recommend it to anyone? No ➖

🕮 Would I want a sequel? No ➖ 

📚 Would I want to read more books by this author? Maybe 🤷 

💣💥 📢 Content Warnings? Past Trɐumɐ

🌶 Spice? Yes, but mostly talk, no smut

🌪 Plot Twist? No

👟 Pace? Uneven

💻 Tidbits ~ The 1960 Dirty Book Club OG’s: Gloria, Marjorie, Dotty, Liddy.
Dirty Book Club 2.0: MJ, Addie, Jules, Britt

The OGs started their secret book club as a safe place to discuss risqué subjects such as sexual desires, frustrations with their spouses, finding/maintaining their own identities. In the 60s those topics were taboo. They created a set of sacred rules.
1. Tell No one! Keep it secret from husbands as well as others.
2. A husband’s right to privacy cannot and will not be respected.
3. One Out, All Out. If one member quits, the club would be disbanded.
4. Full Moon Meetings.  Meet monthly to discuss the latest scandalous books and how they affected their lives.
There were others but you get the picture.
They also made a pact that when all their spouses died they would move to Paris to live out their golden years together.

The potential 10-10. 
The delivery, ~sigh, disappointing.

I enjoyed the original Dirty Book Club members substantially more than the current crew.  The OGs were more about deep friendship, whereas the “recruits” seemed more self-centered.

Gloria is elderly when she meets new neighbor MJ and sees a lot of herself in her, primarily giving up her career for her man.

Gloria’s husband is the last to go so keeping their promise, off she goes to Paris without a goodbye. The OGs recruit new members to continue the Dirty Book Club. They are all sent letters explaining and the secret pass key.

After that I lost interest. I felt like it became more of a coming of age story as the younger generation is trying to find themselves while learning the importance of having friends you can trust and confide in.

Gloria was a treasure full of wisdom and advise. I would have enjoyed more of her story. 

🎧 Narrator: Joy Osmanski - meh, one-dimensional and pretty much was just reading the book. 

🎧8.0 hours 🕮 320 pages 



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