Review: A Pleasant Surprise
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 05 21, 2012
I started reading this book expecting a fun, light romance novel. Self-proclaimed boring, mousy woman wants to hire a "bad boy" to help her change her image and show off to old classmates. A plotline that's been done before, but one I still enjoy reading. About 50 pages into it, I was wondering how the author was possibly going to keep this story going for another 150 pages or so. Then BOOM! the twist came - one I was not expecting it at all and one that changed the tone of the book completely. Don't get me wrong, it was still first and foremost a romance, but now it had so many more layers. Layers that forced me to sit up and take this book more seriously than I had intended and compelled me to keep reading because I honestly didn't know how it would end. My only complaint is that at times it seemed like she was trying a bit too hard to make this book more serious and maybe added in one too many challenges -- there're only so many dramatic incidents a person can have in their life without it seeming unbelievable(I'm intentionally being vague to avoid spoiling any of the story - if you read it, you'll know what I mean). Maddie (the heroine) becomes a little annoying with her over-the-top prejudices about Scott's profession, but she redeems herself later in the book. I really enjoyed watching their relationship evolve as they learned more about each other.Even without all the twists and drama, this book would have been worth reading just for the pleasant romance alone. But, Sandy James impressively takes some not-so-pleasant subjects and uses them to add depth to what would have been an otherwise run-of-the-mill love story.