Tonic by Staci Hart

 1.5 Stars

I am still amazed that I actually managed to finish this book.  It consistently felt like I was reading a book meant for tweenagers that had been "spiced up" (if you get my meaning) for an adult audience.  The only thing that felt real was the way the manipulation of participants in a Reality TV Show was described from a behind the scenes point of view.

After only a couple of chapters I was heartily sick of the uber-butch Joel and the icy Annika.  I only remember their names because of the blurb telling me.  The characters are so one dimensional it isn't funny and their reactions and behaviours are certainly not those of a fully functional human being.  There isn't even any humour to distract you from the awful flatness of the characters.  There is a reliance on physicality between the two to try and keep the reader interested but it is badly written so even that doesn't really work.

On the whole avoid, avoid, avoid.

This review has been a long time coming.  I actually read this book between the 28th June and 4th July 2020 so my memory is a bit foggy about all the plot lines.  Fortunately, I have a notebook where I jot some initial thoughts on the book and an overall ranking so between the book blurb and that I did have a reasonable handle on what I thought at the time of reading.