Summers are supposed to be fun, right? Not mine. I’ve got a job at my dad’s company, which is sponsoring a college scholarship competition. I just found out that, in addition to my job assisting the competing interns, I’m supposed to vote for the winner. Totally not what I signed up for.
My boss is running the competition like it’s an episode of Survivor. Then there’s Carlos, who is, well, very distracting––in a good way. But I can’t even think about him like that because fraternizing on the job means instant disqualification for the intern involved.
As if that’s not enough, an anonymous informant with insider intel is trying to sabotage my dad’s company on social media...and I’m afraid it's working.
Much as I’d love to quit, I can’t. Kristoffs Never Quit is our family motto. I just hope there’s more than one survivor by the end of this summer.
About Lisa
Brown Roberts:
Award-winning romance author Lisa
Brown Roberts still hasn’t recovered from the teenage catastrophes of tweezing
off both eyebrows, or that time she crashed her car into a tree while trying to
impress a guy. It’s no wonder she loves to write romantic comedies.
Lisa’s books have earned praise from
Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, and the School Library Journal. She lives in
Colorado with her family, in which pets outnumber people. Connect with Lisa at www.lisabrownroberts.com.
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Excerpt from Spies, Lies, and Allies:
“Let’s see where helping me on my
project falls on this list.” Carlos picks up a pen and clicks it, eyeing me
from underneath ridiculously long lashes.
Cautiously, I take a tiny step toward
his desk so I can read the list.
“Number three.” I point to the napkin.
“Teamwork.”
He nods and underlines the word. I
notice he’s added numbers six through ten. Nothing is written next to those
numbers, except for ten, next to which he’s drawn a smiley face.
“What’s that for?” I point to the
smiley face. He leans back in his desk chair and grins up at me.
“Not sure yet.”
My heart throbs in my chest and my
imagination is off and running, fantasizing about number ten.
Carlos points to number five:
nicknames. “I think this is where we left off at lunch.” He clicks his pen
repeatedly and I resist the urge to snatch it out of his hand. “I’d prefer not
to be nicknamed for a pasta, but I gave you a cereal nickname, so…” He shrugs
but keeps his eyes on mine.
“I…pasta…what?” He’s not making sense.
He bites his bottom lip, and I have no
trouble picturing what will make me “smiley face” if we ever make it to number
ten. Also, I’m pretty sure he’s a mind reader because his gaze drifts down to
my lips, then back up to my eyes.
“The Manicotti. Who is it?” He glances
across the room. “Elijah? He can be sort of cheesy.”
My mind analyzes his words, sliding
them around like one of those puzzles where you have to move a string through
twisted metal. And then it clicks.
“You read my notebook! You’re the
one who—” Panic zings through me as I remember what I wrote about him, Carlos is trouble, and his editorial
comment, True. Is Carlos adorable?
Apparently I’m not the only spy
around here.
“Why’d you pick this desk?” I’m
desperate to change the subject.
“I like the view.”
“But it’s better by the windows.”
“Depends on which view we’re
talking about.” He gives me a cryptic smile, one that makes my stomach dip.
“Anyway, I saved your notebook. You’re lucky no one else read your notes.”
Mortified and defiant, I cross my
arms over my chest. “You didn’t have to read it. You could’ve just returned
it.”
“I was just checking to make sure
you’d listed all of Mr. Mantoni’s rules.”
“Uh huh.”
Across the room, Elijah stands up
and stretches. He glances at us, an amused smirk twisting his lips like he
knows something I don’t.
Carlos writes on the napkin again.
Number six: healthy disagreement.
“You’re kidding, right?”
His responding grin packs more
heat than it should.
“I think we’ve gone off track.”
I’m proud of how calm I sound, even though my nerve endings are exploding like
firecrackers.
Giveaway:
On the upside, there were some great relationships exhibited here. Usually, I'm all about the main couple in a YA contemporary - give me more! - but i the case of "Spies, Lies, and Allies", there were two, more secondary, relationships that I really enjoyed. The first was between Laurel and her father. It was obvious that Laurel adored her dad, even though he could be a bit scary sometimes. She bugged and nagged and bugged some more, until her dad let her work at his company for the summer, just so she could spend some more time with him. Really?! How sweet! What teenage girl do you know who would do the same? They also had a lot of sci-fi geekdom going on between them. Good grief, the girl even calls her dad, "Dad Vader"! There were some fun moments between them throughout the book.
The other relationship that surprised me in its development was the one between Laurel and Trish. Trish was the daughter of Dad Vader's right hand man. She was portrayed as a real emo-goth-angry-girl. Eventually, though, Laurel was able to find some common ground with Trish, and it was rather nice to see.
As for Laurel's relationship with Carlos, I like how there was a gradual building up to friendship before continuing on to something more. There was plenty of banter and sarcasm between them that kept me giggling.
I did have some problems with this book, mainly the overuse of the sci-fi references and Laurel's constant need to over analyze every. Little. Thing. If you can disregard things like this, however, you will probably enjoy "Spies, Lies, and Allies".
My rating: 3 stars
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