Book Review: Strange Bedpersons by Jennifer Crusie

Strange Bedpersons
Author: Jennifer Crusie
Publication: HQN; First Time Paperback edition (October 15, 2012)

Description: Tess Newhart knows her ex-boyfriend Nick Jamieson isn't the right guy for her. He's caviar and champagne; she's take-out Chinese pot stickers. He's an uptight Republican lawyer; she was raised in a commune. He wants to get ahead in business; she just wants…him. But there's no way Tess will play second fiddle to his job.

Yet somehow she finds herself agreeing to play his fiancée on a weekend business trip that could make or break Nick's career. And while he's trying to convince Tess that he needs her in his respectable world, Tess is doing her best to keep her opinions to herself and her hands off Nick.

My Thoughts: This was an engaging contemporary romance about a couple that appears to be polar opposites. Tess was raised in a commune and is a liberal, helping sort who can't pass up a person in trouble. Nick is an uptight Republican lawyer whose main goal is making partner in his law firm. 

However, Nick needs a fake fiancée in order to get a new client, encourage the head of the firm to retire, and become a partner. The firm is courting conservative author Norbert Welch and Tess has read and despised his work. Welch does a reading and Tess recognizes a story that was told to her often when she was eight and in the commune. Is Welce a plagiarist? That would really make it hard for Nick to represent him. 

The story also has a secondary romance going between Nick's partner in the law firm and Tess's best friend. 

Both romances concerned how much a person should change for the one they love. It was also a humorous romance. I liked Tess's observations but disliked her seeming inability to see anyone else's point of view as valid. This romance from 1994 is showing its age a bit but was still enjoyable. 

Favorite Quote:

The problem with Nick was that, aside from the fact that she never knew when he was going to be Alaan Alday and when he was going to be Donald Trump, it was getting harder and harder to pick a fight with him because he was right there in bed with her, and if she reached out she could have him, and she wanted him.

She really wanted him.

I bought this one as part of a Jennifer Crusie Bundle August 11, 2009. You can buy your copy here.