SHELF LIFE by Christina George

Publisher:   Createspace
Date published:   September 7, 2013
ISBN:  978-1484984680
Genre:   Contemporary Romance
Book format: ARC
Obtained via:  Author
Reviewed by name and email address:  Gina Ginalrmreviews@gmail.com

 

Coming back to herself after the death of someone special in her life named Allan, publicist Kate Mitchell is trying to sort out some other issues in her life such as what to do about  two men vying to have her in their lives. Romance, however, takes a back seat to her clients, each with their own set of issues.  There are the murderous twins, authors gaming the system, the alcoholic aging rock star and the meditation guru to name a few. Always ready to take one for the team, despite her bids to take one more serious work and authors, Kate goes along to get along with her boss, Edward.  But when one publishing disaster after another crops up in her life Kate is ready for a change. While at a conference in Los Angeles she meets a young woman who has a story to tell that could impact the lives of many abused women. When Edward declines to take on the woman’s story Kate makes some decisions that have been a long time coming including leaving her married boyfriend and building a future with Nick. Can she really leave the mistakes of the past behind and open her heart to true love?

When I saw the blurb for THE PUBLICIST: SHELF LIFE by Christina George offered for review I anticipated a sometimes funny, well written glimpse into the inner workings of a publishing house.  It wasn’t quite what I expected. While the beginning started off somewhat amusing and there were other funny scenes most of the book read like a ripped from the headlines geared toward a bad cable television movie. The murderous twins, while female, are reminiscent of the Melendez brothers. In California, where the twins live, a convicted killer cannot benefit from the crime—i.e., a convicted killer cannot write a tell all from their jail cell and make money off the book. A little research would have shown the author that thread in the story is not realistic. Yes, SHELF LIFE is fiction but accuracy is appreciated.

I did not read book 1 so found myself meeting characters that I didn’t particularly like and no idea how they fit in the story.  A bit of backstory would have fleshed them out and not made it necessary to have read book 1 to know what was going on.  I had a hard time believing Nick was straight and could easily see him in a loving relationship with another man. Overall there wasn’t one character I felt connected to.

There is a considerable amount of head hopping which had me going back and re-reading pages to make sure I was following the thread of the story.  Mac’s wife’s name was changed during the story—but since I read an ARC this could well have been caught and corrected. 

There are some amusing titbits in the and if you like Life Time movies this would be a great read for you. The author does try to include something for everyone. 

This is an objective review and not an endorsement of this book.