The Great Taste of Straight People

Like so many of her ""chick-lit"" peers, James (editor of the on-line Postfeminist Playground) shows a poignant, almost Kerouac-ian faith in the products of her pen--no matter whether the subject is loutish boyfriends, caricatured feminists, the travails of middle-class girlhood, vague fantasies of thrill kills or the questionnaires in women's magazines. Sometimes, in James's case, the rambling pays off in a clever one-liner--as when a pregnant woman considers naming her child Dignity even though ""if a girl the obvious porn career, Hot Dignity Dog, made it a bad choice."" More often, however, these 19 stories trail off without even that; most could pass for e-mails written to pass a long, uninspired afternoon. (Sept.)