Rating: 
Summary: Olivia Goldsmith should be ashamed...
Review: ...and so should her editors and publishers. This book is just awful. It would be good had it been written by a high school sophomore as an extra credit project. The subject material, the style are just plain frenetic, and it runs out of breath in about 35 pages. Actually, I suspect that this book was written by someone other than the author of "The First Wives' Club". It's that bad and that different.
Rating:
Summary: The First Chapter Was Bad, the Second Chapter Confirmed It.
Review: Olivia Goldsmith's books usually have me intrigued from the first page. I read the first chapter and kept thinking "something's wrong". I read the second chapter and decided that someone else is writing for Olivia. I'm not looking forward to reading the third chapter. As of this moment, I doubt very much that I will continue with this farce. Ms. Goldsmith should be ashamed that this book was published under her name. Perhaps, it would have been better received by the reading public if she had used a pseudonym.
Rating: 
Summary: Since When Does Goldsmith Write for Harlequin????
Review: Oh... sorry... I guess it just seemed that way. Considering that Goldsmith is usually known for writing novels (i.e. books with actual plots), this was a far cry from her earlier ventures which I have enjoyed for the light fluff reading they are. This, however, was nauseatingly predictable a la Harlequin, et al. While not completely terrible, it was a far cry from Goldsmith's usual wit (see Young Wives as an example)and its characters were cardboard flat. Tracie is hardly an exemplary young woman and Jon turns into a complete male slut. I found it hard to believe that anyone who was initially that sweet and good could do such a 180-degree turn. Very unlikely.Additionally, who the heck edited this thing? For instance: on one page, it said Tracie stood up to leave. On the very next page, about two paragraphs later, it says "they got up to leave". At one point, Jon mentions how Tracie was there when he bought his condominium. At the next, Tracie is griping about Jon's "exorbitant rent". Etc. Etc. The lack of fine tuning on this book is blatantly evident, which makes for a bad read. One last thing, what kind of sexual ethics do these people have? Jon has slept with several of Tracie's friends, yet this doesn't bother her in the least, nor does it bother her that her best friend may be getting ready to follow the same route with Phil, Tracie's ex. And most disgusting of all, Jon sleeps with Allison and then goes straight to Tracie's bed... and she KNOWS he just crawled out of Allison's bed. Of course, then again, she crawls right back into bed with Phil, so I guess they're all just one big happy sperm bank. Disgusting.
Rating:
Summary: What happened to the editor?
Review: I honestly don't think I've ever read a book with so many inconsistencies in it. I won't go into them, although they were annoying (along the lines of: Phil puts on his jacket and leaves, but is nibbling Tracie's ear two paragraphs later???). The very worst mistake(unforgivable), to me, was that the first time Jon and Tracie "get together", he had just been in bed with Allison. GROSS! He leaves Allison in bed, races across town, and finally takes Tracie to bed, supposedly after years of loving her. No shower first. How romantic is that? Where was the editor?
Rating: 
Summary: Why don't people like it? It's GREAT!
Review: This is such a fun and enjoyable book! I don't understand how it's gotten such flak here. It's refreshingly different that Goldsmith's other books- there are fewer main characters. It's a nice twist on a typical romance, and the ending is somewhat predictable of course, but the characters are wonderful, the dialogue is funny and I have read it 3 times already! Give this book a shot, and see as Tracie tries to make over her good-boy friend Jon into a bad boy, and her work goes a little TOO well, only to find herself falling for Jon's inner good boy. All around a fun, fast-paced happy read.
Rating: 
Summary: Fun! Fun! Fun!
Review: Take a clean cut young man who holds a steady job with a high tech company, makes a great salary, and still after all these years cares enough about his mom and step moms that he visits them on Mother's Day. Only problem is he can't get a date because he's too "nice." Put him under the tutorage of his best friend of seven years who sets out to turn him into a "bad boy", every woman's dream and what happens? Well, that's the story. Tracie is a writer who is in love with a bad boy. She treats him like a king and he treats her like dirt. In fact, the worse he treats her the more she seems to want him. Tracie and her friends all seem to go for the bad boy type. In fact her childhood best friend, Laura has recently moved in to escape her relationship with a bad boy. Jon has been one of Tracie's best friends for seven years. He recently waited in the rain for two hours for a date that never showed. While Jon is a fairly good looking guy, he seems to get treated like dirt by women. Many consider him a nerd. The problem? Jon is too nice for his own good. He is a truly likeable man who treats women with respect-something they don't seem to want. Out of desperation, Jon turns to Tracie and begs her to turn him into a bad boy, someone who can get and keep a date. Tracie, the writer who is always looking for an angle to write about, sets out to recreate Jon and some hilarious moments follow. Jon, while he never sees the logic of the "Bad Boys" rules begins to see success in this experiment. The worse he treats women, the more they flock to him. Tracie, on the other hand, begins to grow up and see there is more to a relationship than being the one who makes all the sacrifices. By the time she realizes this Jon is out of control, her life is out of control, and the whole experiment is headed for disaster. I've never read anything by Olivia Goldsmith before and I have to say I enjoyed this book. It's funny, fast paced, and reads smoothly. I loved the character of Jon, that loveable nerd trying to be a bad boy. I'll never look at men in an airport or sporting goods store the same way again. Tracie and her friends? Well frankly I wanted to smack them for hanging out with losers and wanting more. Part of me was yelling, "grow up!" while the other part of me is thankful to know the difference between a good man and a bad boy. Bad Boy is a fun read and makes me glad I'm not on the dating scene anymore.
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Summary: surprising! a nice twist on the romantic comedy
Review: I was intrigued by the this book because, frankly, I love makeovers. The fact that I've read a thousand cinderella stories and seen nearly as many romantic comedies in the same vein never stop me from indulging in one more. Usually the outcome is predictable and the route, although sometimes varied, usually progresses on autopilot. "Bad Boy" was right on target for the first half of the book; Goldsmith created a likeable heroine, an even more likeable hero, the loyal heroine sidekick, a smart-mouthed fairy godmother/waitress, and lots of fun minor characters. In the second half of the book, she starts scrambling emotions and motivations and people get scared and startled and even, gasp, gain weight in response to emotional deprivation. (Question: Why do you never see Meg Ryan polish off a pint of Ben & Jerry's whenever Tom Hanks/Billy Crystal/etc does something obnoxious?) The book's premise is that Jon and Tracie have been friends for seven years and meet once a week so that Jon can moan about being a social pariah (but a very successful professional computer genius) and Tracie can moan about falling for jerks and hating her job (no "but very successful" for her). Because Tracie is an expert on bad boys and bad boys always get laid, Jon enlists Tracie's help to become a bad boy. He succeeds, of course, but in the process Tracie realizes that she's completely missed the sexual aspect of Jon's personality and can't understand the source of her insane jealousy after every woman in Seattle suddenly wants him (I was waiting for a fountain to light up and erupt as in "Clueless"). However, the second half of the book, although it does progress somewhat along the expected track, is riveting. I was fascinated by Jon's transformation and also with Tracie's. I really liked both characters, but emphathized more with Jon's and was thrilled that Goldsmith let him question every step and conquest rather than just be led blindly by Tracie. We hear some of his inner monologue and it isn't telepathically injected into Tracie's thoughts in the next paragraph. The writing is quick and well-tempoed, and Goldsmith's romantic suspense lends just the right amount of reader agony. "Bad Boy" won't be up for a Pulitzer, but it is a fun book with some substance beneath the fluff.
Rating: 
Summary: Passable but really...
Review: I am not a big fan of olivia goldsmith... but i was capitivated by the summary of the book and grabbed it to read. The book is not as good as any other olivia goldsmith books but it is still passable and not that bad.
This book pushes me to read other olivia goldsmith books as I am impressed by her style of writing and her wit. Those Olivia Goldsmith die-hard fans will find this very disappointing but those just starting out to read her books will find it not too bad. I liked the ending too.
I think she shouldn't have written about something she didn't really know and the whole bad-boy change didn't really hit off well. However, I liked the character of Tracie as well as Jon as well as Tracie's oblivion to Jon's love. It made quite interesting reading.
Rating:
Summary: What a waste of time
Review: Totally predictable and not worth the energy spent turning the pages. Granted, you don't expect Goldsmith to be Shakespeare, but this even falls below her previous works. "First Wives Club" and others have redeeming moments, are humorous and a diverting "fun" read .... but this is just awful, demeaning, page-filler!
Rating:
Summary: Rather Stinky
Review: I picked up Olivia Goldsmith's last novel, Young Wives, in paperback, and I couldn't put it down. I was thrilled to find she had another book out already in hardcover so I bought it .... I let my friend read first, and she said she liked it. After I finished reading about it, she told me she lied because she didn't want to ruin it for me. Tracie was so annoying, I don't know how she had any friends. Jon was so gullible, I didn't know how he made any money. There were so many subplots (unresolved) that I don't know why she even bothered. What happened to Jon's father? He was dying, so okay, that'll do it? What about Tracie's boss coming on to her? Oh, that's okay, don't do it again? Her life at work seemed abstract and unrealistic. I don't know why her friend Laura was even in the book, she was only on about ten pages. It was a crappy book, and I forced myself to finish it. How stupid does a guy have to be to do the things she was asking him to do??? 'Nuff said.
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