Crash Test Love by Ted Michael

The last thing Henry Arlington wants is a girlfriend. He's just very, very good with girls - reading their body language, knowing what they want to hear, and more importantly: getting them into the backseat of his car. But all that changes when he meets Garrett Lennox at one of the many Sweet Sixteen parties he crashes.

Garrett thinks she's done with guys. She was dumped by her ex when she moved from Chicago to Long Island, and now she realizes that she needs to find out who she is by herself, instead of witha boyfriend. What she really needs is some good friends.

Fortunately for Garrett, the J Squad - the "it" girls of East Shore High School - want her in their clique. All she has to do is pass one little test: get East Shore god Henry Arlington to take her to one the biggest Sweet Sixteens of the year, then dump him in front of everyone.

Garrett has promised herself not to fall for another guy, so playing with Henry's heart shouldn't be hard. Right?

And Henry doesn't fall for girls, so when he and Garrett start to click, it doesn't matter. Does it?

As William Shakespeare once said, "Love is blind," or in this case, the lovers may be, as Henry and Garrett fall in love - and into the trap that awaits them. Because neither of them can see what the girls of Henry Arlington's past have in store. (Taken from back cover)

I really enjoyed Crash Test Love. For some reason I'm always wary about romances written by men, but I loved The Diamonds by Ted Michael so I was expecting Crash Test Love to be good. And it was. I liked how it was written in alternating point-of-views so we could get each side of the story. It was nice to see the characters grow and develop as the story moved along, and with each of their point-of-views included, the reader could easily see the progress. In the beginning Garrett is really emotional and needs to have a boyfriend and Henry is the opposite. He hooks up with a lot of girls and is unable to get close to them. But by the end, they are practically different people, in a good way though. Another strong point for Crash Test Love was that it was extremely funny. Once while reading this I was drinking Gatorade and started laughing and actually choked on it. So be careful because you will laugh and you don't want anything in your mouth. As for the ending, the message was really good and I thought it was refreshing that it was not a traditional love story. I hope that doesn't give anything away, but you probably won't be expecting the ending that you read. But it's worth it. I promise.

8 out of 10.

FTC: I received this book through Random Buzzers.

The Diamonds by Ted Michael

Marni Valentine is part of the Diamonds, a group of the most popular girls at the prestigious Bennington School on Long Island. Along with her friends Clarissa, Lili, and Priya, Marni commands the respect of all her classmates. But when the Diamonds are asked to join the mock trial team, the girls take their power a little too far. Clarissa decides to use mock trials to resolve disputes between classmates, something all the teachers and faculty love. But when the Diamonds start bribing jury members and influencing the decisions of the court with a bias, Marni starts getting a little wary of what's going on. It's not until Marni is caught kissing Clarissa's ex-boyfriend and is promptly excluded from the Diamonds that she decides to take action against the Clarissa's corruptness. She assembles a group of students that have been victimized by the Diamonds to bring justice where it is due.

I was pleasantly surprised by this novel; it was a lot better than I expected it to be. From the summary on the back, it seems like another Gossip Girl or The Elite, but in fact it was a lot different. It was less about rich, popular girls, and more about a corrupt court system at a private school. The set-up was actually pretty interesting. Bennington has a mock trial team, like a lot of schools do, and the Diamonds decide to use it as a forum to resolve disputes between classmates. So people who have gotten in fights or cheated on their boyfriends come and the Diamonds decide who's guilty and deliver a punishment. The faculty is so impressed that they allow the Diamonds to give out detentions and suspensions, which is something a regular school would never allow. But Clarissa, the corrupt politician that she is, bribes the jury and bribes students to testify against each other, so she can put her "frenemies" in their place. The faculty and club advisor are oblivious to everything that's going on, so we have four girls who are practically running the school. A plotline not often seen in literature, so Michael has the originality factor on his side. What was also cool was all the references to the Constitution and other legal documents in US history. It seemed like the author really did his research. From my summary, I'm sure you can guess the ending, but there were some twists and turns that were unexpected. I really liked this book and think that anyone with an interest in law or history will especially enjoy this informative, and at times comedic, novel.

8 out of 10.

Release Date: April 14, 2009