Bet Me (book) by Jennifer Crusie

This is a portion of a post from A Library Girl's Outlet, May 11, 2008:

I recently finished reading Jennifer Crusie's Bet Me (click on this link - a little way down the page, Crusie has a link to her recipe for Chicken Marsala), a romance novel about a woman (Min) dumped by a guy (David), who promptly bets another guy (Cal) ten thousand dollars that he (Cal, not David) can't get her to sleep with him in less than a month. Min, of course, manages to listen in just enough to know that there's a bet about her, but not enough to know how much it's for, and not enough to know that Cal doesn't actually accept that bet (he does accept another less slimy bet). This is a Big Misunderstanding story. It's also an I'm Too Fat For Him To Really Want Me story, as well as a My Family (Especially My Parents) Is Messed Up story. None of those aspects of the story are very original, but then, there's not a lot of things in romance stories that are original. That's not necessarily a bad thing, either.

I read romance for the characters and the way the relationships between them develop, and I love how Jennifer Crusie does things. I picked up Bet Me because Crusie's works tend to have humor, even if they're not humorous through and through, and I needed a bit of humor in my life, as well as the knowledge that, here at least, things would end happily despite some occasional bad moments. Generally, when I want a low stress, enjoyable read, I turn to Jennifer Crusie, Nora Roberts, or Jayne Ann Krentz. In fact, if you like any of those three authors, I'd recommend trying one of the other two.