THE SECRET BETWEEN US (Barbara Delinsky) - August 20/11

This chick-lit book contains a decent premise - a teenager hits a man and her mother takes the blame - that is effectively squandered by Delinsky. The author places a consistent emphasis on the characters' melodramatic exploits - eg the mother's anger towards her ex, a character's suspicion that her husband is cheating, the girl's guilt over the accident, etc - and it does become more and more difficult to care about any of this. The Secret Between Us is clearly attempting to come off as a Jodi Picoult-type story, but it's rarely as entertaining or compelling as Picoult's work. ** out of ****