Scandal by Lauren Kunze and Rina Onur

Scandal by Lauren Kunze and Rina Onur
Release Date: February 26, 2013
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Source: Bought
Goodreads Stars: 2
Rating: Bland

Buy the Book: Amazon UK

You know you're not the author of the "Ivy Insider" articles.

But how are you going to prove it?

Callie Andrews returns from spring break to find herself facing expulsion. Someone has framed her as the author of a series of anonymous articles vilifying an elite social club and now, unless she can prove her innocence, she can kiss her college education good-bye. So who is the Ivy Insider?

ALEXIS
the girl who has had it out for Callie since day one

GREGORY
the guy who told her he loved her (at least she thought she heard that) but then he vanished in the middle of the night

MATT
his friendship supersedes his hatred for social clubs—right?

or VANESSA
Callie's best frenemy

. . . or is it someone else entirely? Callie's made more than a few enemies during her freshman year, but can she count on her true friends—and the (missing, just-maybe-meant-to-be) love of her life—to pull through? - Goodreads

As a huge fan of the previous books in this series - especially the first one - I was both excited and disappointed to read Scandal. It had been an entertaining ride, and I wasn't really sure if I was ready to let these characters go. They aren't the best characters ever, not by any means, but they provided enough entertainment to keep me reading well into the night. The Ivy series - prior to Scandal - is a fun and light contemporary that I'd definitely recommend to anyone who wants a break from a heavier read.

While I enjoyed Scandal to an extent, it wasn't as great as I was expecting it to be. Since it's the last book in the series, I was hoping for something that would blow me away, but unfortunately this felt like a filler. And it's the final book!

My main issues with this book are the plot and the writing. Callie spends most of the book trying to figure out who set her up, and while it could have been interesting, the plot didn't feel very fluid. In fact, it was as though we were stuck on this one plot point throughout the entire book, with nothing else to balance it out.

The book went from scene to scene and did little to keep me interested. There were few emotional scenes, if any at all, and most of it was just pointless drama that was there to stretch the book out. It all felt very lazy.

I must admit, I also didn't like how little Gregory was in this book. I was hoping for some drama between him and Callie, but instead there was nothing. I didn't even get a decent make-out/make-up scene. Gregory doesn't come back until the final few chapters, and his absence is keenly felt. I found myself not caring once he arrived back at Harvard, because there wasn't enough substance between him and Callie any more.

All in all, I am disappointed by Scandal. With a final book in a series, you expect something that will blow your mind. In fact, I think you NEED something like that to give a great series an epic send off. Instead what Scandal is, is a slow and fairly boring read. It's like one of those TV filler episodes that writers do because there are too many episodes in a season and they need to stretch out the story a bit more. There was no passion, and no excitement.

And now I'm going to go and cry, because this series was so great before it lost its mojo. *sniffs*