Book Review: Black Ties and White Lies by Kat Singleton

This is our review for Black Ties and White Lies by Kat Singleton – a billionaire romance novel.

At the time of publishing this guide, this story is available on Kindle Unlimited.

Star rating

(Did Not Finish at 48%)

Pepper rating (find our Pepper scale here)

(See below for more about this rating)

Book Review:

I don’t really read reviews before I read a book myself. If I wonder what others thought – especially if they agreed with my thoughts on the book – then I’ll check out the reviews when I’m finished.

It seems that Black Ties and White Lies by Kat Singleton highlights the flaw in my system. After I finally chose to DNF (Did Not Finish) it, I mosied on over to Goodreads to see what other readers thought and I immediately saw 1* reviews stating simply “DNFd at 14%”, and “DNFd at 6%,” and “If you told me this was written by a 14 year old I’d believe you.” Those are in juxtaposition to the many 5* reviews raving about this book, leaving it at an average of 3.5*.

I don’t think 1* and “I DNFd at 48%” is helpful for someone reading reviews to choose their next read. It was a push to get as far into it as I did. I too was ready to DNF really early on but I thought, just give it time. I usually try to find something positive to say in my reviews, even if I didn’t enjoy the book, but I’m really struggling. Overall, I found this book incredibly difficult to read for a few reasons, and really the only reasons most people read a spicy book: the characters, the plot, and the spice levels.

First, the characters. Neither Margo nor Beckham, who is Margo’s ex-boyfriend’s brother, are likeable at all. I mean, she has friends and he says she’s wonderful but the reader doesn’t see this behavior on the page at all. We have no idea why Beckham “Beck” Sinclair should be so obsessed with her that he buys the company she works at to make her become his assistant and fake-fiance for a year in the opening pages. Margo Moretti has no backbone to truly stand up for what she wants and just gives in to whatever he says because he is the “I always get what I want” type of alpha-male character. She caves time and again and sees it as a win when she holds out for 5 minutes to this powerful and wealthy man’s demands.

Meanwhile, there can be a fine line between being grumpy and being an expletive-hole but with Beck, to quote Joey Tribbiani, “[he]’s so far past the line, [he] can’t even see the line, the line is a dot to [him].” And I’m here for a redemptive arc: please show me his trauma and torment so I can understand, then let me revel in his character development as he changes into the kind of broody but loving man we all know he can be. But, if I’m not even seeing glimpses of it by 48% through the story, something is wrong with this character at the foundational level. In this case, I’d say that’s true since he also blamed his desire for her on her, as if he had no agency or control after a certain point.

Second, the plot or the writing – I’m not sure if the issue is more with one than the other, but both worked in tandem to make this book unreadable for me. The storyline of a taboo trope of boss/employee didn’t really hit right since they don’t even start their first day at work until about 40% into the story. It felt like the plot jumped around, made assumptions that the reader should just know certain things, and the internal monologues felt really repetitive. I find that repetitiveness could be the work of a new author who hasn’t had the benefit of a good editor or, in the new Wild West of self-publishing, they are trying to pad the book to get pennies for each page read. My impression of this work is that it’s probably the latter.

Finally, it’s a spicy romance that has been rated as 4/5 for explicit scenes. If that’s the case then it’s a slooooooooow burn. There were 2 scenes by 48%, when I stopped reading, of them kissing in the kitchen and then in a dressing room. So for me, it’s a 1p since I can’t vouch for any other explicit content.

So, if you like an underdeveloped plot that repeats itself without going anywhere while you follow unlikeable characters who don’t get it on until at over halfway through the book, then this is the book for you. And if I had to sum up this book in one sentence like many of the other 1* reviews did? It felt like trying to read the Wish version of 50 Shades of Grey.