Red Heart Tattoo by Lurlene McDaniel – Review

I have read countless Lurlene McDaniel books and have loved nearly all of them, Red Heart Tattoo has me teetering on the edge of like and dislike. A high school bombing is a tough subject to write a novel on, however I think it could have been done a bit better. The novel was short, too short to properly develop the characters. The characters were pretty cliché. A popular girl with a jock boyfriend and a bad boy who’s in love with the popular girl, I’ve read many books with the same concept, but this ‘love triangle’ was torn apart by tragedy. This is what set this common love theme apart from all other novels, they had to figure out a way to get over the devastating event that has taken place.
The writing didn’t seem very mature, these are high school students, and high school students can have a mature voice. When teenagers text they don’t talk like “WHERE R U?” “TLK 2 U SOON”, we can write actual words in a text message. The language in this book seemed like it was written for younger children but with older characters.
I would give this novel a 3.5/5. If it had been longer and more potential for character and plot development, I think I would have enjoyed it a bit better.