Chishamiso

I wanted to like this book. But, I was offended by the author's unexamined contention that qualified wealthy White children were being kept out of elite private schools by less qualified minority children. She doesn't come right out and say that the minority children are less qualified. But Ivy and her friends clearly see the efforts to create ethnic diversity in predominately White elite private schools as problematic. She even goes so far as to have Ivy encourage a White child to impersonate as Black in order to gain admittance to a prestigious school. Apparently this was supposed to be light and entertaining. It wasn't. The whiny, self-consumed attitude of the main character was also highly annoying. The Nanny Diaries are MUCH better.

This book was awful. The writing was surprisingly poor given the excellent work typically produced by Tananarive Due. Her books are excellent. But, this collaborative piece consisted of a painfully thin plot strung together with needlessly long drawn out sexual scenarios that did not add to the content. The narration was also painful to listen to. For better books, particularly mystery/thrillers, I would suggest anything (else) by Tananarive Due or Brandon Massey.