Girl Anatomy: A Novel

From the looks of her debut novel, Girl Anatomy, Rebecca Bloom at least seems to have a functioning sense of humor. When her narrator, Lilly, talks about getting over a guy, she describes trying to lose him like a dieter's last five pounds, those ones that "attach to your inner thighs and warble 'Hot Lunch' every time you take a step." Lilly is a twentysomething Los Angeles mess, unable to find love and underappreciated at work. When her best friend gets engaged, Lilly decides it's time to stop whining and pull herself together. The novel follows her as she parties, shops, and smooches her way to self-empowerment. Lilly has a sunny optimism about the perfectibility of human nature that suggests her author is a perfectly lovely person. Unfortunately, her author also happens to write like an illiterate teenager. The book reads as though Bloom kept a personal diary, changed the names, and called it fiction. To wit: "I always have and will love cute boys. Actors usually happen to be cute, and although lately I have moved on to musicians like Jonah, I still have a soft spot in my heart for film stars. John Cusack, are you listening?" She'd better hope not. --Claire Dederer