In Faking It, author Jennifer Crusie (Welcome to Temptation, Getting Rid of Bradley) once again presents an enchanting mix
of romance, mayhem and mystery for the delight of her readers. There is
nothing fake about Faking It, nor about the tears of laughter it's bound to leave readers with.
Meet Matilda Goodnight, a mural artist with a colorful
past as an art forger who hates her current job. Tilda is determined to preserve her family
and art gallery's good name and pay off the mortgage. However, everything is
jeopardized the day beautiful Clea Lewis walks into their gallery and buys
the one painting that Tilda thought would never see the light of day. Tilda
and her panicked mother Gwen come up with the ingenuous but risky idea of
Tilda stealing back the painting. On this dangerous mission, in Clea's
closet, Tilda collides with the even more dangerous and charismatic Davy
Dempsey. Davy (born into a family of scammers but trying his level best
to reform) is hiding in the closet because he is trying to steal back the
millions which Clea and his ex-financial manager, Rabbit, relieved him of.
Things begin to snowball from there.
Intrigued by the multi-faceted and asthmatic Tilda, Davy follows her back to
her home after stealing her painting for her -- only he's stolen the wrong one.
He rents a room in their building and, from then on, Tilda keeps tripping
over this supposedly ex-conman/FBI agent even as she frantically tries to
protect her eccentric family and its dark secrets. Alternately aiding and
hampering the entire dingbat affair is an array of perfectly madcap and truly
remarkable secondary characters: the Double-Crostics and vodka-loving Gwen; Tilda's sister Eve (with her dual personalities); Eve's
daughter Nadine (who is determined to date careers); Andrew (Eve's gay ex-husband); Simon (who may or may not be FBI); Ford (who is most probably a
hit man); blonde bombshell Clea (who has a tendency of leaving behind a
trail of dead husbands) and many, many more. Poor Tilda seems to be the only
sane one left, and even she is not sure as she finds herself falling for the
tempting faker, Davy. But what is Tilda hiding in the basement? Will Davy
get what he wants? What is all this about being a 'doughnut' or a 'muffin'? Will
they all continue 'faking it'?
Jennifer Crusie has established a reputation for writing books that are
superb blends of romance, secrecy, comedy, mystery, drama and farce, aided by
wonderful casts of characters, plots within plots, all set in some small
town in Ohio. Faking It follows the same pattern. But Crusie has a way
with witty and hilarious dialogues and mixed up, mad, and confused characters
and devious plots, making each of her books distinctive and
exceptionally read-worthy And she does all this even while making the characters
so real and flawed, so average that they are utterly convincing. A must-read for
anyone who appreciates laughter.