Over Her Head by Shelley Bates

On the surface, Over Her Head is a departure for Shelley Bates. But never fear, die-hard Shelley Bates fans, it isn't.
The plot follows a middle-aged woman as she discovers the body of a teenager one morning during her jog. The teenager is one of her daughter's classmates in high school. The mother of the teen goes on a seemingly feeling less journey of grief, which leads her into a manufactured, unnecessary romance that almost gets discarded at the end. But the author resurrects it at a very inopportune time.
The lead's daughter is accused with assisting in the murder, and she does have something to hide. But the real criminal is very obvious, mostly because of what I call an email subplot.
There aren't really any good characters; they're mostly perfect.
The bulk of the book (thank God it was short) is filled up with pointless conversations and thoughts that do nothing to develop the characters, which they should. The end is very cheesy and expected. But those who have always been fans of Bates will like this book.
2 stars

Grounds to Believe by Shelley Bates

Unfortunately, Grounds to Believe was everything I expected it to be. The storyline and ending I predicted when I read the back and saw the cover was true. While there's nothing wrong with it, it also fell in line with all the other predictable, average novels on the market.
It's about a man searching for his daughter, who was taken by a cult several years before. His searching has led him to another cult where he meets a woman and tries to get her to open up. After several dates deemed illegal by her cult, the man miraculously finds a piece of evidence leading him to his daughter.
The characters are bad; either dramatic or perfect.
I didn't really find any purpose in reading this book. I started and ended it feeling the same way: disappointed.
The book didn't take me very long to get through, thank God. This kind of writing makes me think Bates has no backbone to be original, but only to copy the same old story over again. But this is a debut novel, so we'll have to see what she does next.
1.5 stars