Sign up for our newsletters to receive our Best of 2024 ezine!

Summary and Reviews of Good In Bed by Jennifer Weiner

Good In Bed by Jennifer Weiner

Good In Bed

by Jennifer Weiner
  • Critics' Consensus (6):
  • Readers' Rating (18):
  • First Published:
  • May 1, 2001, 384 pages
  • Paperback:
  • Apr 2002, 400 pages
  • Rate this book

About This Book

Book Summary

Weiner's witty, original, fast-moving debut features a lovable heroine, a solid cast, snappy dialogue and a poignant take on life's priorities.

For twenty-eight years, things have been tripping along nicely for Cannie Shapiro. Sure, her mother has come charging out of the closet, and her father has long since dropped out of her world. But she loves her friends, her rat terrier, Nifkin, and her job as pop culture reporter for The Philadelphia Examiner. She's even made a tenuous peace with her plus-size body.

But the day she opens up a national women's magazine and sees the words "Loving a Larger Woman" above her ex-boyfriend's byline, Cannie is plunged into misery...and the most amazing year of her life. From Philadelphia to Hollywood and back home again, she charts a new course for herself: mourning her losses, facing her past, and figuring out who she is and who she can become.

Chapter One

"Have you seen it?" asked Samantha.

I leaned close to my computer so my editor wouldn't hear me on a personal call.

"Seen what?"

"Oh, nothing. Never mind. We'll talk when you get home."

"Seen what?" I asked again.

"Nothing," Samantha repeated.

"Samantha, you have never once called me in the middle of the day about nothing. Now come on. Spill."

Samantha sighed. "Okay, but remember: Don't shoot the messenger."

Now I was getting worried.

"Moxie. The new issue. Cannie, you have to go get one right now."

"Why? What's up? Am I one of the Fashion Faux Pas?"

"Just go to the lobby and get it. I'll hold."

This was important. Samantha was, in addition to being my best friend, also an associate at Lewis, Dommel, and Fenick. Samantha put people on hold, or had her assistant tell them she was in a meeting. Samantha herself did not hold. "It's a sign of weakness," she'd told me. I felt a small twinge of anxiety work its way down my spine...

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!
Reading Group Questions and Topics for Discussion


  1. With Good in Bed, Jennifer Weiner has garnered a lot of early praise for her alternately hilarious and poignant dialogue, and also for her pitch-perfect ear in rendering the conversational rhythms of Cannie's first-person narrative voice. Looking back through the novel, what is it about the dialogue that works so well? In what ways does it serve to subtly develop each character's motivations and idiosyncrasies?

  2. Discuss, in connection with the previous question, the specific tone and quality of Cannie Shapiro's voice. What techniques does Weiner employ to make Cannie's musings and descriptions come across so intimately? What sets the author's style ...
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Reviews

Media Reviews

Entertainment Weekly
A crackling debut...Cannie emerges as one of the most engaging, realistic female characters in years...Grade A.

The New York Times - Janet Maslin
This season's beach-book Queen for a Day.

Booklist - Kristine Huntley
.. a rollercoaster ride of ups and downs, wild success and bitter lows, during which Cannie finds success, peace, and even love. A warm, refreshing story.

Kirkus Reviews
Weiner's voice rings true as she flouts conventional wisdom about what women want. An unpredictable and impressive debut.

Library Journal
Weiner's first novel should satisfy readers from older teens and above.

Publishers Weekly
Weiner's witty, original, fast-moving debut features a lovable heroine, a solid cast, snappy dialogue and a poignant take on life's priorities. This is a must-read for any woman who struggles with body image, or for anyone who cares about someone who does.

Author Blurb Susan Isaacs,
Good in Bed is a delight, a contemporary Cinderella tale told with intelligence, wit, and style.

Reader Reviews

sheila

Good in Bed
Wow!! This was an outstanding book. It made me laugh and cry. I saw myself in the main character and loved the ending. There was not one boring moment in this book. Even though I kind of wished she would have let Bruce seen their daughter.
Trish

realistic and very funny
I loved this book! I was hoping to stumble upon a new author (well new to me) while browsing in the bookstore, someone that could capture my attention and force me to read more chapters at night rather than going to bed at a reasonable hour for work....   Read More
Erinleigh

This book hooked me on Jennifer Weiner. I am an avid fan of her books now and have also read TextIn Her Shoes, the follow up to Good in Bed. I will definitely be looking forward to future titles by this author!
Lindsay

I loved it!!! It's the most enjoyable book I've read this year!

Write your own review!

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

Read-Alikes Full readalike results are for members only

If you liked Good In Bed, try these:

  • Broken For You jacket

    Broken For You

    by Stephanie Kallos

    Published 2005

    About this book

    More by this author

    Funny, heartbreaking, and alive with a potpourri of eccentric and irresistible characters, Broken for You is a testament to the saving graces of surrogate families, and shows how far the tiniest repair jobs can go in righting the world’s wrongs.

  • I Don't Know How She Does It jacket

    I Don't Know How She Does It

    by Allison Pearson

    Published 2003

    About this book

    More by this author

    In a novel that is at once uproariously funny and achingly sad, Allison Pearson captures the guilty secret lives of working women--the self-recrimination, the comic deceptions, the giddy exhaustion, the despair--as no other writer has.

Read-Alikes are one of the many benefits of membership. To see the complete list of this book's read-alikes, you need to be a member.
More books by Jennifer Weiner
Search read-alikes
How we choose read-alikes
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket: Daughters of Shandong
    Daughters of Shandong
    by Eve J. Chung
    Daughters of Shandong is the debut novel of Eve J. Chung, a human rights lawyer living in New York. ...
  • Book Jacket: The Women
    The Women
    by Kristin Hannah
    Kristin Hannah's latest historical epic, The Women, is a story of how a war shaped a generation ...
  • Book Jacket: The Wide Wide Sea
    The Wide Wide Sea
    by Hampton Sides
    By 1775, 48-year-old Captain James Cook had completed two highly successful voyages of discovery and...
  • Book Jacket: My Friends
    My Friends
    by Hisham Matar
    The title of Hisham Matar's My Friends takes on affectionate but mournful tones as its story unfolds...

BookBrowse Book Club

Book Jacket
In Our Midst
by Nancy Jensen
In Our Midst follows a German immigrant family’s fight for freedom after their internment post–Pearl Harbor.
Who Said...

The low brow and the high brow

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Big Holiday Wordplay 2024

Enter Now