The Marriage Pact/ Michelle Richmond / 414 pgs

With The Marriage Pact, I probably should have paid more attention to the blurb. If I had, I probably wouldn't have read it, which in the end would have been best. Jake and Alice are a newly married couple in their mid to late thirties. They are invited to join the Marriage Pact, an exclusive "club" whose purpose is to make sure people stay married and stay happy. At first glance this seems like an okay premise but the Pact goes to such extreme lengths (monitoring, kidnapping, incarceration, torture) to achieve its goal that I just couldn't take it seriously. No one cares this much about another couple's marriage. The story is told in first person from Jake's point of view and while he wasn't an unlikable character, he also didn't seem very realistic. We also only got his view of Alice, which made her seem distant and again unrealistic. There is a twist at the end which some readers might like but the very end of the book is ambiguous, which many readers won't like.

Along Came Love/ Tracey Livesay/ 384 pgs

This was a fun contemporary romance that starts with the heroine being arrested for burglary. While that sounds crazy, things settle down from there. The heroine, India, is a free spirit who has attachment issues due to a childhood spent in foster homes. The hero is an IT CEO with loads of money (though he’s thankfully not obnoxious about it, except for one small line that the heroine gives him grief for) and a protective instinct. These two hooked up for a sexy weekend some three months ago and guess what--India is pregnant. I enjoyed this story because the characters felt like real people and the author wasn’t afraid to tackle tricky subjects (adoption, foster care, interracial relationships) head on and with real emotion. This is a new-to-me author and while I’m not a huge fan of contemporaries, I am tempted to seek out her other books.

Unlucky 13/James Patterson and Maxine Paetro/384 pages/1 December Challenge Met

The Women's Murder Club is back for another set of adventures. Lindsay Boxer is loving her life as new mother, Yuki has some life-changing news, Claire's life is just humming along and Cindy is trying to get over a broken heart. When a couple of college kids literally blow up and their last meal looks to be the cause, Lindsay is on the hunt for the "belly bomber." A menace from the past comes back to even the score, and Cindy is determined to get a front page story from it. Yuki's life takes both a happy and terrifying turn.


Another quick read from Patterson. Just a warning: don't take this with you to read on a cruise.


December challenge met:5 Golden Rings

RIPPER / Isabell Allende / 478 Pages

A compelling new novel from the author of MAYA'S NOTEBOOK, ISLAND BENEATH THE SEA, and ZORRO. This time Allende takes on the crime genre presenting the reader with a classic thriller featuring Amanda Martin, a brilliant, teenage sleuth.

Amanda is a high school senior heading toward MIT  who is obsessed with crime and the online mystery game Ripper. She has convinced her fellow players to use the game to solve a string of murders which have recently occurred in her home town of San Francisco. Amanda is enjoying leading the investigation into real-life mysteries until her mother Indiana, a holistic healer, suddenly disappears and may just be the killer's next victim.  (Advance Reading Copy; publication: February 2014)

RIPPER is a fast-paced, entertaining thriller which should appeal to adults and teens.