Sunday, June 2, 2013

Review: Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin

Skinny Bitch in Love by Kim Barnouin
Publisher: Gallery Books
Genre: Fiction Skinny Bitch In Love Cover
Release Date: June 4, 2013
ISBN: 9781476708867
Buy it here: Amazon | B&N

Clementine Cooper is a vegan chef whose career is on the rise until a bitter rival strikes her down with a pat of butter. Blackballed from the cooking community she loves, Clem decides to start the Skinny Bitch Cooking School so she can pay the rent and save up to open Clementine’s No Crap Café. It’s a brilliant plan…until her dream location is snapped up by Zach Jeffries, a restaurateur with a fondness for steer heads and steakhouses. Clem decides to give Zach a piece of her mind, but finds herself attracted to the sexy carnivore instead. What’s a good vegan to do?

Skinny Bitch in Love is a fast and fun read that’s perfect for summer! Kim Barnouin, coauthor of the Skinny Bitch lifestyle and cookbooks, brings her love for veganism and acerbic commentary to the world of fiction, and I was entertained by the result.

Clem is a bold heroine with lots of talent and little patience. She’s not as likeable as her lively roommate, Sara, and there are a number of times she screws up and pushes Zach away with her attitude. All the same, there’s something about Clem that draws you in. Zach, in turn, is a guy with a (mostly) relaxed attitude who’s able to go toe-to-toe with Clem — not an easy feat. The two of them bicker their way into love, but even so I wouldn’t call Skinny Bitch in Love a romance. The story is really more about Clem’s growth as a chef, and though sometimes things come surprisingly easy to Clem, the road to her various successes as a chef and businesswoman makes for an entertaining journey.

A cast of spirited secondary characters (most of whom are Clem’s cheer squad) bring humor to Skinny Bitch in Love. The supporting cast also provides Ms. Barnouin with a way to seamlessly integrate information about veganism into the story. If you’ve read the original Skinny Bitch you know that Ms. Barnouin is passionate about being vegan. I bring this up because (1) Skinny Bitch in Love is very much a love letter to veganism and (2) this might bother some readers. As a vegetarian leaning toward veganism myself, I enjoyed Clem’s commentary on the subject. However, if you’ve never read any of the Skinny Bitch books you might be in for a surprise.

Skinny Bitch in Love is a sassy story that’s a delight to read. Fans of the Skinny Bitch series should snap this one up!

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