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Readers & Writers Ink Reviews

PLUM GIRL
Jill Winters
Contemporary Romance
September 2002
Onyx
ISBN: 0-451-41048-3

Lonnie Kelley is a temporary administrative assistant at the Boston law firm of Twit and Bell, despite holding multiple college degrees.

The office is populated with characters both annoying and amusing. She's seeing a stand-up comedian who lives in New York City, and they enjoy a relatively comfortable, almost platonic relationship. Lonnie also has the requisite matchmaking mother, who dislikes her current boyfriend and is determined to see Lonnie married off to someone who will both appreciate her and support her in style.

Life gets more interesting when Lonnie runs into an old college acquaintance who works in the same office building. Dominick can send her into sexual meltdown with a look. But what is Lonnie to do about Teddy, the guy in New York? For that matter, given that Dominick was a friend of Jake's and Jake is the man who broke her heart for eternity, why would she want to have anything to do with him?

Lonnie's boss, Beauregard Twit, is driving her nuts with demands for faxes that never appear and constant changes in the holiday party she's been charged with arranging for the employees. About the time she's ready to kill him, another body shows up. Sneaking into the coat room for a quick bit of passion at the holiday party, Lonnie and Dominick are startled when Luther Bell falls to the floor from behind the rack of coats.

The police seem unable to determine whether the death was a result of murder or natural causes. The chief detective asks Lonnie to keep an eye out for any strange happenings at the law firm. Given that everyone seems strange, Lonnie has a bit of trouble sorting out regular strange from criminal strange, despite overhearing threatening discussions and observing unusual behavior.

PLUM GIRL held a lot of promise in both the back cover blurb and the opening of the book. Unfortunately, the promise was never fulfilled. The potential plot was little more than a blurred background for the lustful thoughts and defensive moves employed by both Dominick and Lonnie. In the end, simple machinations by her little sister are the only thing that bring Lonnie and her lover to potential happiness. Winters has an interesting writing style and, I suspect, a lively sense of humor and wit. I'd like to see her use that within a plot-driven book that reveals more character development.

      -- Reviewed by DanaRae Pomeroy
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