View source for Kiss Heaven Goodbye by Tasmina Perry

{{infobox1
|title=Kiss Heaven Goodbye
|author=Tasmina Perry
|reviewer=Sue Magee
|genre=Women's Fiction
|summary=A bonkbusting blockbuster of a book - perfect summer reading.
|rating=4.5
|buy=Maybe
|borrow=Yes
|pages=448
|publisher=Headline Review
|date=August 2010
|isbn=978-0755358403
|cover=0755358406
|aznuk=0755358406
|aznus=0755358414
}}

A group of students were gathered on a private island in the Bahamas in 1990.  They'd just finished their exams – for some it was A Levels and for others it marked the end of university – but after a holiday of indulgence in drugs and alcohol and with lots of sexual tension four friends found themselves on the beach on the final dark night.  In front of them was a body, but they took the decision to let someone else make the discovery rather than getting involved.  When they searched the beach the next day the body had gone – and they had no idea how.  They did have a suspicion that Miles might have been involved in the death.

As is always the way, friendship suffers when a secret is being hidden.  First to find herself an outsider is Sasha.  She's gone to the island hoping to secure an engagement to Miles, heir to the wealthy owner of the island, but their relationship was over before the end of the holiday and she was left trying to make a living as a model, then as a stylist.  Miles seemed self-assured but there's a lot of doubt and confusion hidden beneath the surface.  He was never going to be short of money but with issues of his own and trying to follow in the footsteps of a famous and successful father life was never going to be easy.

Alex was a talented musician but he went to the island with a disadvantage.  He only met Miles through being a scholarship boy at the school Miles and Sasha attended.  His mother managed to keep him there by doing part-time jobs as a cleaner, or working in the newsagent's shop. There was something very appealing about Alex – particularly to the fourth of the students.  Grace was Miles' older sister.  She was clever, thoughtful – and despite the fact that Alex was younger than her she had something of a crush on him.

The book follows the four until the summer of 2010, when Miles wants to sell the island, but a survey reveals a body which has been buried for twenty to thirty years and it looks as though the four will need to go back to the island one final time.

You can call the book what you like: ''blockbuster'', ''bonkbuster'' ''sexy saga'' – it's all of these and more.  It's a brilliant read rather than great literature (and there are times when you really don't want great literature).  It is sexy, but it's a great deal more than a series of sex scenes stitched together.  It's a damned-good story which got hold of me of the first page and simply refused to let go.  For days I was completely involved in the lives of the four and towards the end there was no way that I was going to put it down. There's a real twist in the story which I wasn't expecting.

If you're after a really good holiday read then you will struggle to do better in 2010.

I'd like to thank the publishers for sending  copy to the Bookbag.
In 2010 we can also recommend [[Midnight Girls by Lulu Taylor]].  Buy both books and that could be your holiday reading stitched up.

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