Review: The Marriage Pact by M.J. Pullen

Okay, before we get all judgy on why I even picked up (read: downloaded) this book in the first place, you have to understand that sometimes the NYPL e-books come fast and furious (I think I have 8 checked out currently?) and sometimes there is a serious drought. Case in point, I had finished up my queue and being an Amazon Prime member (yes, yes, I know I'm putting the local, independently owned bookstores out of business, but I die for free 2 day shipping on dog toys) and started running through the Kindle Members Lending Library (it's tepid, at best).

Anyways, I initially was (very, very) confused and thought this was The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides (sometimes, I do the Cliff Notes version of life), so faster than you could say Justin Bieber, this book was in my Kindle and I couldn't borrow any more books until June. Dang.


The synopsis was every terrible chick flick you could conjure:

Marci Thompson always knew what life would be like by her 30th birthday. A large but cozy suburban home shared with a charming husband and two brilliant children. A celebrated career as an established writer, complete with wall-to-wall mahogany shelves and a summer book tour. A life full of adventure with her friends and family by her side.

Instead, Marci lives alone in 480 square feet of converted motel space next to a punk rock band, hundreds of miles from her friends and family. She works in a temporary accounting assignment that has somehow stretched from two weeks into nine months. And the only bright spot in her life, not to mention the only sex she’s had in two years, is an illicit affair with her married boss, Doug. Thirty is not at all what it is cracked up to be.

Then the reappearance of a cocktail napkin she hasn’t seen in a decade opens a long-forgotten door, and Marci’s life gets complicated, fast. The lines between right and wrong, fantasy and reality, heartache and happiness are all about to get very blurry, as Marci faces the most difficult choices of her life.

Yep, this book was a train wreck that I somehow felt guilted into finishing because I had been so flippant about downloading it. 

But, basically, I think I've come to several Life Conclusions based on reading this "book":

1. Do not, under any circumstances, date your boss. Gross and conflict of interest doesn't even begin to describe it.
2. Do not date creepy, insistent business men (yeah, I'm currently struggling through 50 Shades of Grey and this is becoming a theme).
3. Do not break up other people's marriage.
4. Do not think 30 is over the hill and past your prime so that you settle into a loveless marriage because you don't think you have other options.
5. Always, always download the newest Katy Perry song before you go running.

Oh, shoot. I guess that last observation was a personal musing, but a truism nonetheless.

This one was not really worth rating on our typically YA scale, because (alas) this was not YA Fiction - it was Dumb Adult Fiction. That being said, I'm in Rhode Island, so I'm using the Ghost Hunters sign off: On to the next!