Genre: Fiction, Short Stories, Contemporary

Thoughts: I honestly thought that this book would be a quick read, seeing as though it was only like 160 pages, boy was I wrong! The writing style of Eve Babitz is very dense and beautiful. If this was a different book, I tell you, it would have put me into a reading slump. But this book did not and I found myself still going into a routine of reading in the morning, sometimes the afternoon, and at night many times dozing off during those sessions. If I ever were to do writing as a hobby, I'd want to write like Eve Babitz, she has a way of making secondary and background character interesting. There are so many quotable passages in this book that I still think about and regret not highlighting.

So this book is basically a half fictional, half biographical account of L.a during the 1970s. It's centered on the main character who is Eve, and it's basically just her talking about L.A, the people she meets and the relationships that she makes. Some stories include her travels to Bakersfield to visit a guy (who's dad is a respected grape grower) and stays on the farm for a chapter, her relationship with a guy named Shawn who is gay but also has relationships with women (someone in the book points out in confusion), meeting a woman who is so bland and boring that the MC can't differentiate her from the wall(this chapter was my favourite) And other characters few and far between.

As I'm on this journey to be hot and well-read, this book definitely makes it exciting and enjoyable on the way.

Memorable Quotes- "Babitz ceases to be the heroine of her own literary biography, she becomes just another flytrap, not quite cautionary tale, a party girl spattered with genius instead of an actual genius who just happened to, y'know, like to party. Of which, so what? The twentieth century is littered with fabled male geniuses who enjoyed their opium, their reefer, their booze and sex and cocaine, but very seldom are these particular titans introduced drugs and conquests first."

"There were no books in the house and no paintings on the walls. There were photographs of the Nanvilles' children, a boy and a girl. And sculpture. I came to my wit's end in two minutes and hurried into the kitchen demanding to do something like make the salad dressing."

Overall- 8/10

Reread- Yes

Recommend- Yes