Jackie Collins strikes again!

Just as you can't eat one potato chip when you open a bag of Lay's Chips, you can't stop turning the pages when you open a Jackie Collins book.

In her latest novel, Poor Little Bitch Girl, Collins once again writes a page-turner of a novel filled with sex, friendship, a kidnapping, a murder mystery, and characters whose lives are on a collision course. And again, she succeeds in getting the reader's attention and keeping it.

This novel is a perfect beach read, just in time for spring breakers to head south or on a cruise. Denver Jones, a hard-charging LA lawyer meets up again with former high school classmates Annabelle Maestro and Bobby Santangelo Stanislopolous. Annabelle's movie star mother is murdered and Denver is on her movie star father's defense team. No one in LA knows that Annabelle and her boyfriend run a high end escort service in New York.

Bobby is the son of Collins' most popular recurring character, Lucky Santangelo, who makes a welcome cameo appearance in the novel. Another high school friend of Denver's, Carolyn, is a personal assistant to a senator with whom she is having an affair. When Carolyn goes missing, Denver and Bobby team up to help find her.

The plot races at whiplash speed, yet Collins manages to create characters who are interesting. Denver is a favorite, falling for the handsome Bobby and having a torrid affair with an artist she meets in NYC and a Mario Lopez-like TV entertainment show host. (When it rains, it pours for Collins' female protagonists and sex.) Bobby is a chip off the old Lucky block, a hard-working, handsome, rich, good guy- every girl's dream.

One fun aspect of Collins books is figuring out which real life rich and famous people are thinly veiled as characters. I also liked that this book has less graphic violence against women than in earlier Collins novels.

And as always there is lots of sex in the book. Smart men might pick up a copy as a gift for their wives or girlfriends. Just make sure you are there when they finish it a few hours after they start it!

Rating 4 of 5 stars