The Boy Series by Meg Cabot [.epub] [.mobi]

Told in emails, IMs, and brief journal entries, these loosely connected (but each also stands alone) romantic comedies will keep you laughing: "Full of clever e-mail banter and tongue-in-cheek humor, this cheeky novel should be enjoyed in one sitting" (Publishers Weekly on Boy Next Door). Have fun "devouring this fluffy, fun urban fairy tale" (Publishers Weekly on Boy Meets Girl). And be sure to follow it up with Every Boy's Got One, a "frothy concoction of love, friendship and true romance" (Publishers Weekly).

The Boy Next Door is an addictive story told through a series of emails with various senders and recipients. In these emails we learn about Melissa Fuller (Mel) and her previously disastrous love life. We also read about Mel’s neighbor Mrs Friedlander and the events surrounding her mysterious attack that left her in a coma. After the attack John Trent, as a favor to his friend Max Friedlander, came to help with Mrs. Friedlander’s pets and, as per Max’s request, posed as Max. John raises suspicion by insisting that Mel call him John and by not living up to Max’s bad boy reputation. What follows is an interesting story of love and mystery that truly captured my attention in a single sitting read.

Boy Meets Girl is the second book in the Boy series but it is nothing like the first. For one thing it does not, as you would expect from books in a series, continue with the same characters. They main characters are casually mentioned as the book progresses but that is all. In this book we follow some of the lesser explored of the first book. We are also introduced to Kate Mackenzie who is an employee of the New York Journal’s Human Resources Division. She works under Amy Jenkins (the HR devil we were introduced to in the first novel) whom Kate has aptly nicknamed the T.O.D, short for Tyrannical Office Despot. The T.O.D. is making Kate fire Ida Lopez, the highly popular dessert lady for the senior staff dining room, because Ida refused to give the T.O.D.’s boyfriend, Stuart Hertzog (a lawyer for the firm that represents the Journal), a piece of pie. Kate tries to convince the T.O.D. that this was an unreasonable reason to fire someone and tried to get her to pass it of as a warning but the T.O.D. would not be persuaded. Thus, in order to not lose her job, Kate fires Ida only to be sued later for wrongful termination. During the deposition Kate is met with quite a surprise in the form of Mitch Hertzog, brother to the aforementioned Stuart and the lawyer in charge of representing the case for Kate and the Journal. What follows can only be labeled as drama, drama, drama, and not in a good way. Kate feels bad about firing Ida and stresses about it constantly, that and the fact that she likes Mitch but thinks he is only a scummy lawyer. Mitch and Stuart get into it over random family troubles and also a disagreement over the Ida Lopez case.

This story centers around Jane Harris and Cal Langdon. Jane is a cartoonist credited with the creation of Wondercat an internationally recognized comic strip. Cal is a reporter with the New York Journal who recently made a very large book deal. They meet through their friends Holly and Mark whom they accompany to Italy where Cal is the best man and Jane is the Maid of Honor in their elopement. Jane and Cal don’t get the best of starts. Jane labeled him as Cell Phone guy because when she first sees him he is grumpily and endless at it with his blackberry. Cal sees Jane as an eccentric bottled water drinker with an odd obsession for writing in her travel journal. It gets worse when they find that they don’t agree on whether or not Holly and Mark should get married. Jane is all for it because they seem so in love and perfect for each other. Cal however, as a result from being jilted by his wife on their first anniversary, has an unfavorable view of marriage and tries but never gets the opportunity to talk Mark out of it. Slowly however Jane and Cal begin to find positive traits about the other and Cal finds that not only was he wrong about Mark’s marriage but that maybe he ideas about marriage in general were a little jaded. In the end, after jumping through many hoops, Holly and Mark end up happy and Jane and Cal surprise themselves with happiness as well. Overall a pretty good book but I recommend it with some reservations. For some unknown reason when writing for adults Cabot feels the need to infuse her novels with foul language and sexual dialog. One would assume from the cover that the One, in every boy’s got one, is referring to his heart, but with the way that Jane and Holly got on about Cal’s supposedly large appendage one might infer that it is the appendage that the title is referring to.