I'm afraid the title is quite apt. The plot involves a murdered romance writer, and the prose was on the level I expect from the romance aisle--strained metaphors, intrusive irksome dialogue tagging--and even more irksome characterizations. This is told first person, and our narrator, Claire Malloy, describes her own daughter in ways that make her sound like a twit. And yes, I know, Caron and her friend Inez are 14--an awkward and annoying age--but I still never bought either character. We're also supposed to believe that a campus equivalent of NOW is so shocked, shocked by the very idea of a romance book they're planning to protest it even before it's released. Well, given romance books are fifty percent of paperback sales, I'd say they have their work cut out for them. I just never believed in any of the people in this book as real--and I guessed the major twist and identity of the murderer within a few dozen pages--before the actual murder.
