I picked up By the Book from the bookstore, one of the rare books that I bought not only in paper, but also for full price. It was a gift to myself for a rare child free afternoon. It was an amazing gift.

I fell instantly in love with the book. The main character is an English professor who loves books. She loves them so much she went against her family's wishes and became an academic. Her life if flowdering. She has to get a book published in order to gain tenure at a Southern California university where she has been teaching for the last three years. I work at a large university in Southern California, so I saw a lot of humor in the setting of the novel. I could relate to needing to stop for In N Out fries, and I laughed out loud at the email telling faculty that they could not be in the room for faculty evaluations. I am one of few, I am sure, who found the humor in this as I do course assessment.

I love this book. The characters are very real. They are being thrown by the events of everyday life. The comparison between live at twenty and live at thirty is both sad and humorous. The writing is brilliant. They say that those who can't teach - but thankfully Sonneborn can do both. Well in all fairness I have no idea how well she teaches, but I am sure does quite well at that also. I have no doubt that By the Book is a book that I will pick up many more times.