My review of Kathy Clark's "Worst Date Ever (Scandals #3)"

Worst Date Ever {Scandals #3} by Kathy Clark
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book, the third in Kathy Clark’s “Scandal Series”, is labeled by the author as “Young Adult”. I find the increasing categorization of novels as, “new adult”, young adult”, “women’s fiction”, “contemporary fiction”, etc. confusing and on the whole quite arbitrary. The only difference I can see among them is that the characters in the former tend to have blue or purple streaks in their hair, while the characters in the latter tend to have less creative hair and to be a bit more literate.

That being said, Kathy Clark has created some interesting and diverse characters and a tightly woven plot in this light-hearted romantic suspense. Her central character, Tulsa Wiggins, a member of a detective agency, Scandals Investigations, is a specialist in cyber security. She is called upon to investigate a major breach in an on-line dating service by “tracking through the deep net” to discover who has penetrated and is now systematically usurping the site. As an added complication, the owner of the dating company is suspected of having murdered his girlfriend. In the process of solving the case Tulsa meets and falls in love with a fireman, Cody, who is among the suspects.

The story is fast paced, taking the reader along an increasingly dangerous road with threatening notes, car explosions, poisoned pizza and deadly snakes.

Anyone who is deeply into technology will love this book. But it isn’t necessary to understand the vocabulary of the sophisticated computer underground to enjoy the entertaining interplay among the characters or the ingenious complications of the plot.

Having said earlier that I do not always understand or agree with age categorizations of books I must admit that this one will probably appeal most to the decidedly technology oriented younger set.


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This romantic thriller is a mix of hair raising suspense, romance and a sprinkling of humor. 

Escape Rating A - Marlene Harris, EscapeReality.net

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COMING SOON! --- WHERE LEMONS BLOOM

When Eve Anderson meets Adamo de Leone on a ship bound for Europe, she has no idea of the dark secret that will endanger both their lives. She accompanies him to his home on Italy’s Amalfi Coast to open an inn left to him by his grandfather. But then she learns he spent 5 years in prison for a crime he claims he didn’t commit. Could the man she loves be responsible for embezzling eighty million dollars from the investment firm he once owned? 
 

Adamo wants to hold Eve at arm’s length until he can clear his proud family name. But when there is an attempt on his life and Eve is terrorized by a gun-bearing thug, he realizes how much he wants her, and he must accept whatever help he can get to uncover the well-hidden trail of a six-year-old crime.

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