Review: The Givenchy Code by Julie Kenner

I know. I asked for funny book recs yesterday and then went on to read something nobody mentioned. Oh, well. I’m still very glad I read this.

Title: The Givenchy Code
Author: Julie Kenner
Genre: Romantic suspense
Grade: B+
Reason for Reading: I’ve actually wanted to try Julie Kenner fora while, because her books looked like fun, and I needed a buffer book before I tackled the next Meljean Brook book. This one seemed short, funny and a quick read, so I went with it.

Synopsis: Everyone has weaknesses. Graduate-student Melanie “Mel” Prescott’s happen to be haute
couture shoes and complex codes, and who knew one would be the key to staying alive.
When Mel first received a coded message from the tall, dark, and scary stranger,
she thought one of her friends was kidding her, especially after she decoded the
message, which read, “Play or die.” But Mel quickly discovers the message is no joke
and that she has somehow become involved in a real-life version of the Internet game
of Play.Survive.Win. Now Mel is going to need all of her code-cracking skills, and
the help of sexy Matthew Stryker, if she wants to stay one step ahead of an assassin
who won’t stop playing until Mel is dead. A fabulously fun heroine with a math-geek’s
mind and a passion for fashion outwits and outplays a ruthless killer in the latest
ingenious literary creation from Kenner, whose sharp sense of wit is the perfect
accessory for this chic blend of chick lit and thriller.
John Charles
My Thoughts: I really liked this book. Most chick lit doesn’t appeal to me, because I am very much not a girlie girl. I wear worn-out tennis shoes, of which I only have two pairs, I only go clothes shopping under duress, and I wouldn’t know a designer label if it smacked me over the head, so the premise of most chick lit baffles me, because I wouldn’t know how to relate to the types of women who frequent these books in real life if my life depended on it. So I was grateful when I found that I liked Mel. She’s a fun heroine, and though she did do one thing I thought she shouldn’t have so we could have had the last climactic action scene, I mostly liked her. She was funny and self-effacing and a bit snarky, but she didn’t try too hard to be any of those things.

Also, I loved Striker. Loved him in a way that I am tempted to channel my inner Holly, and wax rhapsodic about the many and varied reasons he worked as a hero for me. He was tough, he was confident, and I detected a vulnerability when it came to Mel that I just adored. Plus, we get enough hints into his past that I understood his tortured soul. Plus, it really helped that while Mel thinks he’s hot, she doesn’t spend large sections of the book squeeing over his hotness. Which was, I must admit, a refreshing change from some books I’ve read.

I wasn’t sure that I would buy the romance at the end of the book, because all told the action takes place over a period of days, and most of the time Mel and Striker are running all over creation. But it did work for me, mostly because the characters are both aware of the circumstances that make theirs an odd relationship and react normally.

The plot was also a lot of fun. I could tell that Ms. Kenner knew New York well, and I was engaged, trying in my own former English major-y way to solve the codes, too. The fact that Ms. Kenner kept me as a reader stumped says a lot for the fact that she really has written some smart protagonists, because I always figure if I can solve the mystery before the protagonists do, it’s not a very good mystery.

My quibbles are personal, but they were enough to bring this book out of A territory. I really dislike the use of a mixture of first and third person. It always leaves me feeling the story’s a bit disjointed, and that feeling didn’t go away in this book’s case.

I also have to say, I found the name Matthew Striker just a tad cheesy, and the villain, not to mention the mysterious originator of the game were even worse. Striker I gradually forgave his cheesiness, given that I came to adore him, but the villains had some eye-rolling moments for me.

Overall, this was very much an enjoyable book, and definitely recommended.