A review by andipants
Garden of Lies by Amanda Quick

Did not finish book.

DNF at 158 pages. I was having an awfully hard time making any progress on this book — I'd read a chapter or two, not be drawn in, put it down and go do something else (and the chapters are like 5 pages long, so I wasn't getting anywhere fast). I couldn't put my finger on what exactly was bugging me — the writing quality is only fair to middling, but not outrageously bad for mass market romance, and Ursula seemed like an interesting enough character. Then my husband asked me simply, "What's it about?" and I realized the plot is convoluted as fuck. Slater's family situation makes no sense. His maybe-feud with his former co-explorer makes no sense. His involvement with Ursula's investigation makes no sense. (And speaking of which, what happened to that? Do we ever circle back to that? Isn't that supposed to be the main plot here?) And I absolutely don't buy the chemistry between the romantic leads. Nah, I've got a big ol' TBR pile to get through; I'm done trying to give this a chance.