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Ballantine
July 2006
Featuring: Lucy Stone
224 pages ISBN: 0812971906 Trade Size
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Contemporary Chick Lit
A biologist studying patterns of sexual selection, Lucy Stone knows a lot about matingβparticularly that in the animal kingdom, males will go to any length to attract females. Why, then, are their human counterparts so hopeless in courtship? This is the question that Lucy and her best friend, Martha McKenna, struggle to answer. Consider Adam, Lucyβs boyfriend of two years, who demonstrates on an ostensibly romantic camping trip that he canβt build a fire, split wood, or jump-start a car. Worse still, heβs scared to go into the woods after dark. Or take Jesse, Marthaβs younger brother, an opera aficionado and neurotic extraordinaire who canβt summon the courage to make the first move on the woman heβs crazy about. And what about the extensive list of men with whom Martha has endured the torments of the first date. But then thereβs Cooper Tuckington, Lucyβs best friend from college. Born and bred on his familyβs West Virginia dairy farm, Cooper fits anyoneβs description of a manβs man, and yet he is chivalrous and charming. During his annual visit to New York City, he rewires Lucyβs lamps, builds her shelves, and holds forth on subjects from great painters to the great outdoors, all the while pulling out chairs and opening doors for the ladies. Surely, think Martha and Lucy, the men in their lives would benefit from the tutelage of someone who knows how to treat a woman. Thus, Man Camp is born. With a little feminine persuasion, Lucy and Martha convince Adam, Jesse, and a handful of their other male acquaintances to visit Cooperβs farm, where they will learn everything a guy should know, from cars to carpentry to chivalryβand thatβs just the Cβs. But life on the farm isnβt exactly as it seemsβand the boys soon prove themselves in ways the women would never have imagined. In the process, Lucy and Martha themselves learn a good bit about life and love. The perfect canβt-put-it-down novel for all of us whoβve needed to bring out the inner man in the men we love, Man Camp is a brilliant, witty, and insightful romp through the wilds of dating and mating.
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