Read: Finding It (#09-2022)

Finding It, and Finally Satisfying My Hunger for Life by Valerie Bertinelli

Bertinelli's second autobiographical book - capturing her journey and struggle to beat her self-image issues, and a goal to fit into a bikini for the first time since her twenties. 

This book didn't capture me the way Bertinelli's first one did - she's still personable and friendly, and it's written very conversationally - but her journey to meet a goal and the way that she chooses to meet this goal, just didn't resonate for me in the same way. It almost seems as though she'd fallen into the societal diet/self-image mindset carousel that she claimed to want out of.  Why did she need to pose in a bikini?  What did it prove?  Why did Jenny Craig need to make a bikini contractual? It just seemed antithetical to the first book, which was much more a journey to find a way out of her own mind, and then this one had so much pandering to other people's expectations. It was somewhat disappointing. 

I enjoy the family stories and her devotion to her family and her son. It clearly gives her something to work toward. I'll be reading her latest book shortly, and I have higher hopes for it, since it is titled Enough Already, so it should be about casting aside the expectations and living for yourself. 

(#09-2022)