Have a Nice Guilt Trip

by Lisa Scottoline, Francesca Serritella

Overview

Lisa Scottoline and Francesca Serritella are back with another collection of warm and witty stories that will strike a chord with every woman. This four book series is among the best reviewed humor books published today and has been compared to the late greats, Erma Bombeck and Nora Ephron. Booklist raved of the third book in the series, Meet Me At Emotional Baggage Claim, "readers can count on an ab-toning laugh session, a silly giggle, a sympathetic sigh, and a lump in the throat as life's moments are rehashed through the keen eyes and wits of this lovable mother-daughter duo." This fourth volume, Have a Nice Guilt Trip, maintains the same sterling standard of humor and poignancy as Lisa and Francesca continue on the road of life acquiring men and puppies. Ok, to be honest, Lisa is acquiring the puppies, while Francesca is lucky enough to have dates with actual men. They leave it to the listeners to decide which is more desirable and/or or easier to train.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781466834569
Publisher:	St. Martin's Press
Publication date:	07/08/2014
Series:	Amazing Adventures of an Ordinary Woman , #5
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	eBook
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	90,480
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

LISA SCOTTOLINE is a New York Times bestselling and Edgar-Award winning author of twenty-one novels. She has served as the president of Mystery Writers of America, and her recent novel Look Again has been optioned for a feature film. She is a weekly columnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer, and her columns have been collected in four books and optioned for television. She has 25 million copies of her books in print in the United States, and she has been published in thirty countries. She lives in Philadelphia with an array of disobedient pets.

FRANCESCA SCOTTOLINE SERRITELLA graduated cum laude from Harvard University, where she won the Thomas Temple Hoopes Prize, the Le Baron Russell Briggs Fiction Prize, and the Charles Edmund Horman Prize for her creative writing. She is working on a novel, and she lives in New York with only one dog, so far.

Lisa Scottoline is the New York Times bestselling author of novels including Look Again, Lady Killer, Think Twice, Save Me and Everywhere That Mary Went. She also writes a weekly column, "Chick Wit," with her daughter Francesca Serritella, for The Philadelphia Inquirer. The columns have been collected in Why My Third Husband Will Be a Dog and My Nest Isn't Empty, It Just Has More Closet Space. She has won an Edgar® Award and Cosmopolitan magazine's "Fun Fearless Fiction" Award, and she is the president of Mystery Writers of America. She teaches a course on justice and fiction at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, her alma mater. She lives in the Philadelphia area.
FRANCESCA SERRITELLA graduated cum laude from Harvard University, where she won the Thomas Temple Hoopes Prize, the Le Baron Russell Briggs Fiction Prize, and the Charles Edmund Horman Prize for her creative writing. She is working on a novel, and she lives in New York with only one dog, so far.

Hometown:

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Date of Birth:

July 1, 1955

Place of Birth:

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Education:

B.A., University of Pennsylvania, 1976; J.D., University of Pennsylvania Law School, 1981

Website:

http://www.scottoline.com

Read an Excerpt

Homely Remedies

By Lisa

 

I hate it when Mother Mary is right, which is always.

We begin a zillion years ago, when I’m a little kid with a bad cold, and Mother Mary goes instantly for the Vicks VapoRub. As a child, I had more Vicks Vapo rubbed on me than most consumptives. My chest was as shiny as a stripper’s and even more fragrant.

Camphor is still my favorite perfume.

Which could be why I’m single.

Another favorite home remedy of hers was the do-it-yourself humidifier. By this I mean she placed a Pyrex baking dish full of water on every radiator in the house.

I never knew why, and neither did my friends. None of them had radiators, because they had nicer houses. They had something called forced air, which sounded vaguely scary to us. The Flying Scottolines never forced anything, especially something you needed to breathe.

And in the summer, those same people had central air, which was something else we didn’t have. Our air lacked centralization. The only central thing in our house was Mother Mary, and that was how she liked it.

But back to the do-it-yourself humidifiers, which sat like an open-air fishbowl on every radiator. As a child, I understood that this would cure something dreadful called Dry Air, which we had in spades. I didn’t really understand why Uncle Mikey had to move to Arizona for the Dry Air, when he could’ve just moved to our house, but be that as it may, I was grateful that I had an all-knowing mother, who understood that air came in forced, central, and dry, and that everything could be cured by Pyrex.

The only time this was a problem was on Sundays, when Mother Mary actually wanted to bake ziti or eggplant parm, and there were no dishes available except for the ones cooking water on the radiators. She would dispatch me to get a Pyrex dish off the radiator and wash it out, and I would do so happily, if the end result was eggplant parm.

I will still do anything for eggplant parm.

Make a note, should we meet.

But back to the story, cleaning the baking dishes was a yucky job. Often the water in the dishes would have dried up, leaving a scummy residue, and even if there was some water left, it wasn’t a pretty sight. Dog and cat hair would be floating on the surface, or ash from a passing cigarette.

According to Mother Mary, smoking was fine for air quality.

You win some, you lose some.

So fast-forward to when I become a mother myself, and baby Francesca gets sick, and of course Mother Mary advocates Vicks and Pyrex, but I reject these ideas as old-fashioned. I am Modern.

Enter antibiotics.

I had that kid so pumped up with amoxicillin she could’ve grown mold. In fact, I had her on them prophylactically, so she’d never get another ear infection, and if I could have her on them now, I would, so she’d never get pregnant.

I’m kidding.

It’s a joke, okay?

But then recently, I got the worst cold ever, and I called the doctor, who told me that antibiotics weren’t such a hot idea and what I really needed was Vicks VapoRub and a humidifier. I couldn’t believe my ears. I wanted the magic pill to make it all better but he says that it’s a virus and all that, and no.

I didn’t tell this to Mother Mary. Don’t you, either.

I suppose I could just get a Pyrex dish and put it on the radiator, but I am still Modern and I refuse. Also the doctor says I need a cool-mist humidifier, and not a warm-mist humidifier, and once again, I feel lucky to learn more about the mysteries of air, which now comes in mist.

Who knew oxygen could be so complicated?

So I go to the drugstore, buy the requisite cool-mist humidifier, and bring it home. I spend exactly one night with this thing and want to shoot myself. It’s thirty degrees outside, and in my bedroom, it’s twenty. An Arctic chill blasts from the cool-mist humidifier, and I’m up all night.

So I go back to the drugstore and buy a warm-mist humidifier. I take it home, and it frizzes my hair, but you can’t have everything. Also, it comes with a little slot for a stick that’s impregnated with Vicks VapoRub, and you know what I’m thinking.

This is the revenge of Mother Mary.

 

Copyright © 2014 by Smart Blonde, LLC, and Francesca Scottoline Serritella

Editorial Reviews

02/15/2014
Thriller fans love Edgar Award winner Scottoline's fiction, while readers of humor and heartfelt narrative nonfiction enjoy curling up with the books Scottoline writes with daughter Serritella, who won a stack of awards for her writing at Harvard. This fourth book from the mother-daughter team addresses issues like acquiring puppies (Scottoline), attempting to date (Serritella), and figuring out whether men or canines are more difficult. Lots of book club outreach and pitched as the perfect summer read.

Library Journal

05/19/2014
Popular mystery writer Scottoline and her Philadelphia Inquirer columnist daughter Serritella team up for the fourth time to offer a lively collection of 80 short essays on everything from raising puppies to the proper way to make eggplant parm. Though Scottoline penned the majority of the essays in this volume, 27-year-old Serritella’s contributions display her own brand of humor and sweetness. Scottoline—prone to comedic one-liners—makes the pages fly by in a flurry of laughs. Serritella’s ode to her 90-year-old grandmother (affectionately referred to as Mother Mary) and her writings about her dog Pip are especially endearing. Scottoline is on-target and hilarious, whether she’s writing about politics (her piece on Anthony Weiner is a standout), ex-husbands (“Thing One and Thing Two”), or what it’s like to sleep with five dogs. While Serritella deals with dating, rollerblading, and Facebook, Scottoline, whose “butt is already on social security,” considers joining AARP. Their close-knit, outspoken Italian family is also the subject of a number of laugh-inducing selections. (July)

Publishers Weekly

"Lively, clever, and absolutely relatable, this audio is a winner." - Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher

Lisa and Francesca, mother and daughter, bring you the laughter of their lives once again and better than ever. You will identify with these tales of guilt and fall in love with them and fierce (grand)Mother Mary.

bestselling author of Sister Mother Husband Dog Delia Ephron

Whether Lisa and Francesca are contemplating mommy guilt, puppy love, or baby fever, this fabulous book is that rare mix of LOL wit and exquisite real-world wisdom. Perfect for a day at the beach, a night in the bathtub, or anytime life makes you say (in Lisa's words) ouchie!

former editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan and author Kate White

Have a Nice Guilt Trip is a hilarious look into the modern woman's mind. This duo's ponderings on contemporary life and sometimes stormy family ties are always entertaining. Fasten your seatbelts for the good times ahead.

bestselling author of Ladies' Night Mary Kay Andrews

Lisa and Francesca's writing is so fun, funny, warm, sharp, and emotional that I wish I could both adopt and be adopted by them. Is that legally possible? Good thing Lisa's a lawyer. She'll know.

author of Science…For Her! Megan Amram

Readers can count on an ab-toning laugh session, a silly giggle, a sympathetic sigh, and a lump in the throat as life's moments are rehashed through the keen eyes and wits of this lovable mother-daughter duo.

Booklist on Meet Me at Emotional Baggage Claim

The perfect present for moms, grandmas, and aunts.

Cosmopolitan on Why My Third Husband Will Be a Dog

Scottoline savors every last bit of her life, and so will you.

People on Why My Third Husband Will Be a Dog

Feels like one big gabfest with your best girlfriends, whatever their age.

Occasional Enemies Booklist on Best Friends

A clever compilation from two generations of women reflecting on family, love, dessert, and everything in between.

It Just Has More Closet Space Booklist on My Nest Isn't Empty

2014-05-18
The Italian mother-daughter team is back with another series of amusing commentaries on life.Readers familiar with the Scottoline-Serritella (Meet Me at Emotional Baggage Claim, 2012, etc.) duo are in for another mostly entertaining ride. Ping-ponging back and forth, using mostly one-paragraph sentences, the two writers converse on such diverse topics as the therapeutic benefits of rearranging the furniture on a regular basis, what happens when one forgets to pay bills on time, and why it's best to let your mother buy her own sheets, preferably white—on white sheets, she "can see the bugs better." The authors cover nearly all subjects in 50 narratives, with nothing too personal or taboo receiving scrutiny. Chapter titles include "The Married-Ex Milestone," "Third Month's the Charm," "Rolling Without Homies" and "Call of Jury Duty." Scottoline on gardening: "perennials are supposed to be automatic, in that they come back every summer. Like a yeast infection." On nature: "Let's just say that we're frenemies. Because it turns out that Mother Nature is the ultimate mean girl." Serritella on wish lists: "I love using wish lists, because then the [website] notifies me if the price of my chosen items gets discounted from totally-ridiculously-expensive to get-real-you-still-can't-afford-it." Throughout, the conversations are sarcastic and often snarky, and the short essays revel in the ridiculous and hit the heart of life in a boisterous Italian family. For many singles, Valentine's Day might mean moping, "depression, shame, and chocolate cake," but for Scottoline, it was a day to receive a beautiful engagement ring from herself. A fascination with an electric toothbrush led to the purchase of an electronic face washer. The authors also discuss the pros and cons of twerking and dancing on tabletops.Short and snappy, these comic essays are best read in small doses.

Kirkus Reviews