Great "chick lit" for a rainy, lazy weekend indoors

So, this year I went on a little single-book-shopping spree and bought 4 copies of the same book: one to keep for myself, and the rest to give away as Christmas presents.  I first read The Monsters of Templeton, by Lauren Groff, as a library book last fall.  I adored it, and devoured it curled up under my big down comforter one rainy weekend.  I loved the little nods to history (the town, Templeton, is clearly inspired by Cooperstown, NY) and literature (lots of references to  James Fennimore Cooper character, as well as his stories).  It also had several great characters who were fully, and finely, drawn.  When I saw it on the remainders table at the Harvard bookstore around the holidays I knew it was meant to be - a great book that I would be happy to read again and had no hesitations about recommending, on sale???  Of course, I was simultaneously thrilled to be picking up each copy for around $5 and totally pissed off that such a great book had ended up on the remainder table at all - in my world, this book should be flying off shelves everywhere. Only problem is that I haven't seen half the people I intended to give the book to, so I still have multiple copies on my shelf.  Need to remember to do something about that soon.

I remember being especially pleased with Monsters of Templeton because the other book I had taken out of the library that Friday, and started on the bus on the way home from work, was Sarah Bird's The Flamenco Academy.  That one had been an incredibly engaging (for me) exploration of personal growth and how we construct, and re-construct our identities...complete with a hot Flamenco guitarist, yum.  The exotic lure of flamenco music, dance, and culture for the main character translated to the reader too, and I got sucked in.  I loved Flamenco Academy, just as much as Templeton, albeit for different reasons.  When I was done with it I actually regretted that the experience of reading it was over, and worried that the next book I had to read (Templeton) would be tainted by its predecessor's awesomeness - like when you eat a really delicious peach, juicy and ripe, and then bite into another one and it's all hard and flavorless, or you have a perfectly crisp, tasty apple, and then the next one is mealy and gross.  But Templeton more than held its own, and the two made for a really fantastic rainy weekend.


They may not really be "chick" lit in so much as pink-covered novels, and an engagement ring is not the heroines' goal, but they have wonderfully drawn female main characters, and both explore the way women grow up and how they veiw the world around them as they do so, so I think they are chick lit in the best sense of the term.