Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi

Also reiewed here: http://porcelainulairi.wordpress.com/2011/09/16/review-a-shore-thing/

Let me start by giving you a little synopsis of the “novel” before diving into my thoughts on the whole thing. Giovanna “Gia” Spumanti travels to the Jersey Shore with her cousin Isabella “Bella” Rizzoli for the summer. They plan on having a great time getting drunk and looking for “hot guidos.” Things don’t start out that wonderful, but soon Gia finds a job at the tanning salon, invents the hottest fad of the summer, rescues a landlocked shark, and meets firefighter Frank Rossi. Bella also lands a great job at the gym, teaching “Beat up the Beat” classes, and falls for her boss, Tony “Trouble” Troublino. But what happens when it’s time to leave the shore?

And no, I am not lying… those are the names in the book.

There really isn’t much to this book. You could consider it chick-lit; one with no taste or class (not that I was expecting either). The show was a guilty pleasure for awhile, but it has since lost it’s appeal for me. This book fills the same kind of role. I laughed out loud during some parts, but mostly at the expense of the author. It is obviously terribly written, and whoever was helping her ghost write it needs to be fired immediately. There is nothing worse than a book with typos. Except maybe THIS book with typos.

Clearly, Gia is Snooki and Bella is JWoWW. The first paragraph she starts talking about Gia’s “poof” and every so often she said “waa,” that annoying noise she used to make on the show. But more than this, it is the Italian element that is played up. In case you didn’t know, Snooki is not Italian (she was adopted by an Italian family), but she often pretends that she is. Throughout the book she is constantly throwing it in your face how Italian Gia and Bella are (and obviously the love interests) by using slang or just referencing this fact. I don’t know why this bothered me so much. Maybe it is because I actually know some New York Italians; my fiance comes from one such family. Let’s just say, there was very little tact used when referencing heritage.

All of the characters are poorly developed, especially the love interests. I think the development was given as much thought as their names were. The “plot” makes no real sense, how could it when the heroine saves a shark by stumbling over it. Although, I guess neither does the author’s fame, so I will let that one go. I find myself running out of things to say about the book the more I think about it. The entire thing is a bad episode or two of MTV’s reality show.

My co-workers and I would quote lines at work while we were reading it, since it was so ridiculous. I often said I could feel my brain cells crying out in pain and dying a slow, horrible death. I cannot condone anyone buying this book. I am a little sad that I put money into this sham.… (mer)