The Red Diary Review

The Red Diary By Toni Blake

Lauren Ash has been working hard the last couple of years to get a good position in her dads company, that isn´t just given to her. She lives next to her father Henry Ash, in a smaller house than her dad. When Nick Armstrong was 12 years old his mother died and his father became sad. And because of that his father´s business partner Henry Ash cheated his father out of the company they had started together Double A Construction. After that his father became a more and more failure. Nick is 32 years old, and has 2 siblings, a big sister named Elaine who is 33 years old and a little brother named Davy, who is 27 but has a disseas so he act like a child. Nick has his own painting company named HORIZON PAINTERS. He has always recented Henry Ash and his whole family for doing the thing he did to his family, but over the years he had been forced to do most of his painting business with Ash company, because they payed the most. And now he is going to paint Lauren Ash house, Henry´s daughter. When Lauren the first day is out Nick goes around hee house looking into the windows and he accidentaly nocks over a plant and finds a key, he is intriged and sees her house. He walks into the office in hope of mayby finding some sort of papers that can prove that her father forced his father out of the company, but quickly realize its stupid, instead he finds a book and read the first page and finds out it is Lauren Sex Journal. The next day when he is painting Lauren have Carolyn and some of her friends over and Carolyn invites him to a party that Phil a employed at Ash is having the next day and he says yes, to get closer to Lauren.

At the party a lot of men is asking her out, so Nick saves her by taking her to a beach were they kiss, but she stops him from going any further, eventhough they could have and he drives her back to her car. He then shows up the day after at night when she is nude swimming and they have sex inside in a chair and after he leaves without a word. Monday morning Nick sister calls him and tell him that his father is in the hospital, because of a heart failore for the heavy drinking. That Monday when Nick goes to Lauren´s house she ask´s him why he hates her and he tells her the truth and that he doesn´t hate her, just her father. Lauren can not believe that her father would cheat a fellow partner out of business so she calls he father and ask stupidly about it, and it turns out he did cheat Nick´s father. And she tells him the next day that he was right and she is sorry. When she a little while later cuts herself on a rose Nick helps her clean it in the bathroom and they ends up having sex there. The have sex on another occasition and he stays the night. They also go on a boat trip that friday night and he stays again. The next day Lauren leaves and Nick have the house to himself, and as he look through her book again, he after finds papers and he put two and two together and finds out that Phil a man from the Ash company who own 25 % of it is stealing from it using Nick company´s name in it. He decides not to tell her, but the day after she tells him that the company one day will go to her and he knows that he wont hurt her like that, so he plays innocent and asks to see her office and he then looks at her desk and sees the papers and shows her. They then go to the office and finds more evidence and Lauren later goes to tell Phil´s wife about it and about him cheating on her. Lauren and Nick sort of start a relationship eventhough Nick has from the start said to himself that it wasn´t going to be like that and that he didn´t fit into her world. He also meet her father and they have a confrontation, when Nick goes with Lauren to tell him about Phil. Nick also begins to share more secrets with her and he even takes her to see his sister snd brother, but things don´t go as planned when his dad shows up drunk.

Through the time Nick reads the diary a couple of times, but he is also very guity for doing so, and sometimes that guit stoppes him from doing it. He also goes to ask his father, because Lauren tells him that he should get things of his chest, why he when they were kids after their mother died, he hit Davy with Nick´s baseball bat and that is why he is that why today. And his father tells him that he had thought it was Nick. Nick becomes very upset, but drives to Lauren and tells her everything and he stays the night talking. The next day when Lauren is at the office, he starts writting his own fantasi in her diary about the day they met. He hopes that it will show her that he knows and is sorry for keeping it a secret and he hopes she can´t forgive him. But before he is done, Lauren caughts him in her office and she breaks up with her, tellig that it has all been a lie. 3 days after he saves an abandon he cat, and brings it to Lauren because he knows she has a cat and that she likes them. But the next couple of days Nick makes a plan to get Lauren back, and starts painting picture of her fantasies and planning on taking her to and island. She agrees to go with him and sees the picture and he tells her he loves her and they make up. In the end he tells her to marry him.

A okay book, but te cover is a little boring, but describes the book well.


Grade: 4