These are independent reviews of the products mentioned, but TIME receives a commission when purchases are made through affiliate links at no additional cost to the purchaser. Set in the boho-chic town of Hudson, N.Y., Jen Beagin’s laughter-inducing Big Swiss centers on a sex therapist’s transcriptionist, a 45-year-old California transplant named Greta. The novel follows the adrift Greta as she begins to fantasize about a 28-year-old patient who she lovingly names Big Swiss—ostensibly because she’s from Switzerland and, well, she’s tall.

It may be time for Mattel to roll out Retirement Barbie. Friday morning, the toymaker announced that the doll’s sales dropped 16% in 2014, marking Barbie’s third consecutive year of falling earnings. “The reality is, we just didn’t sell enough Barbie dolls,” CEO Bryan Stockton explained to investors last January, following Mattel’s disappointing 13% drop for 2013. The decline of the company’s premier product led in part to Stockton’s resignation on Monday.

“The Lord of the Rings” is one of the highest-grossing film series of all time, having grossed $2.9 billion worldwide. But, according to Cate Blanchett, that doesn’t necessarily mean the actors earned a handsome salary for their involvement in Peter Jackson’s film trilogy.

TALENTRECAP.COM Talent America's Got Talent Jill O'Rourke Jill O'Rourke Jill O’Rourke is a contributor at Talent Recap, writing news stories and recaps for shows like ‘AGT,’ ‘The Voice,’ and ‘American Idol.’ She graduated from the University of Georgia with a degree in English and Film Studies, and has been writing about pop culture since 2012, with previous bylines at Crushable and A Plus. Jill spends her free time binge-watching sitcoms and daydreaming about life as a hobbit → Recent Posts

Common Core, this is not your week. First you get publicly dumped by the entire state of Indiana, then a dad with an engineering degree calls your math strategy “ridiculous” in a viral Facebook post. The frustrated father pointed out that if anyone at his job approached a problem in the way he’s saying is recommended by the Common Core, they’d be fired. This is embarrassing, considering the program was designed as a set of national curriculum standards that would teach kids the skills they need for real-world careers.