Item: I'll Have What She's Having
Rating: 1.00
Author: biblioholicbeth

by Rebecca Harrington

Rebecca Harrington leaves no cabbage soup unstirred in I'll Have What She's Having, her wickedly funny, wildly absurd quest to diet like the stars.

Elizabeth Taylor mixed cottage cheese and sour cream; Madonna subsisted on 'sea vegetables' and Marilyn Monroe drank raw eggs whipped with warm milk. Where there is a Hollywood starlet offering nutritional advice, there is a diet Rebecca Harrington is willing to try. Facing a harrowing mix of fainting spells, pimples and salmonella, Harrington tracks down illegal haggis to imitate Pippa Middleton, paces her apartment until the wee hours drinking ten Diet Cokes à la Karl Lagerfeld, and attempts something forbiddingly known as the 'Salt Water Flush' to channel her inner Beyoncé. Rebecca Harrington risks kitchen fires and mysterious face rashes, all in the name of diet journalism. Taking cues from noted beauty icons like Posh Spice (alkaline!), Sophia Loren (pasta!) and Cameron Diaz (savory oatmeal!), I'll Have What She's Having is completely surprising, occasionally unappetising, and always outrageously funny.

I'm not generally a huge celebrity follower type, but the idea of someone following the various diets of different celebrities and reporting back with a "hilarious look" sounded like it could be fun to read. It wasn't.

I realize "hilarious" means different things to different people, but at no time did I find this book funny. It seemed to be more a glimpse into the author than it did the celebrities she was emulating. It read more like a series of diary entries by someone who had nothing better to occupy her time and truly thought that these diets were a pathway to a better life. That just doesn't scream funny, but rather somewhat sad.

As for the format itself, if you took away all of the extra spacing between paragraphs, you'd have half the book. Seriously.

I wanted to like this book - but I had to force myself to finish it.

I'll Have What She's Having

by Rebecca Harrington

Reviewed by Beth C. on Oct 10, 2014

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