Elda Minger’s The Fling features Big Misunderstandings, small misunderstandings, one Big Secret, and several other plot contrivances, including a studied unwillingness to communicate on the part of both protagonists. In spite of that, I confess I enjoyed the book a good deal.

Kate Prescott is the responsible one in her family, and so it is to her that everyone turns when her beloved cousin Patti’s fiancé stands her up at the alter. Kate agrees to take Patti on a recuperative trip to Hawaii. On the plane, Kate and Patti meet a former showgirl, Cherry Jubilee, who is on her way to the islands intending to find and marry a millionaire. The three are soon the best of friends, and they all have goal for their Hawaiian vacation. Patti wants to get over Roger the Dodger, Cherry wants to find her aforementioned millionaire, and Kate, well, Kate just wants to loosen up a little. Maybe go on a date. She’s not ready for a full-fledged fling, though.

That changes when Kate meets Jack. Before she even knows who he is, they have shared an incendiary tryst on the beach. Soon Kate learns that Jack is a bartender at the resort where they’re staying. At about the same time, Jack overhears Cherry discussing her plans for a millionaire. Jack assumes that Kate is a fortune hunter too, and is furious.

Jack, you see, is not merely a bartender; he is the fabulously wealthy son of the even-more-fabulously wealthy owner of the resort, James McKenna. James plans to retire and turn the resort over to Jack, but first he wants Jack to work at the resort incognito, in order to understand the lives of the bellhops and waiters in his employ. Jack is required to keep his identity a secret during this ten-day trial period. If you think this plot device seems a bit manufactured, it is based on a thread of fact. People who go through hotel and resort management training programs have been assigned to work in the trenches to learn all parts of the operation…but they aren’t required to keep their identities secret. Minger’s artistic license is more far-fetched because James is worried that Jack hasn’t gotten married yet, so his real plan is for Jack to fall in love during the ten days he’s masquerading as one of the little people.

What makes this book work is that it is written as pure, unashamed escapism. Kate, Patti, and Cherry sashay their way from one Hawaiian attraction to another, worrying about their love lives while shopping, lunching, sunbathing, snorkeling, and checking out the resort’s apparently unlimited supply of good-looking, available straight men. As the misunderstandings pile up, it’s hard to take the characters’ angst too seriously – but then, by the time the secondary character who looks exactly like Brad Pitt in Legends of the Fall shows up, I wasn’t taking them terribly seriously anyway. And besides, if you’re willing to buy the premise that Kate and Jack fell passionately in love before they even had a conversation, then misunderstandings are bound to follow.

There is one plot contrivance that I was not willing to swallow. That is the Meddling Relative cliché. We are told over and over that Jack’s father James is compassionate and caring. This, while he manipulates Jack shamelessly, not to mention telling huge whopping lies every single time he opens his mouth. My favorite: he informs Jack that he, James, is attracted to Kate and plans to have an affair with her. In order to make Jack jealous, you understand. For Jack’s own good. Once this lie is told, it just sort of goes away – there are no consequences of any kind. But for me, the damage had been done. Compassionate, caring parents do not manipulate their children like game pieces – if mine ever tried it, they’d be hiring a private detective to try to find me, regardless of how good their intentions were. James’ scheming is supposed to be amusing, but for me it really jarred with the rest of the book (which actually was amusing). Besides which, I have run into this contrivance in at least three other contemporary romances I’ve read this year. It has officially been done to death.

On the other hand, I loved the trio of Kate, Patti, and Cherry. While this book is unabashedly romantic, it is also a paean to the friendship of women. Kate may be the focus of the novel, but Patti and Cherry are both well-drawn and distinct characters in their own right, and the friendship between the three is just as important as the love story.

The upshot of all this is: The Fling is sexy, fun, light entertainment. The plot is cobbled together from clichés, but the characters are nice, and it’s hard not to enjoy all those lavish, sensual descriptions of shopping, eating, and sunbathing by the surf. Those willing to overlook the obvious plot problems should find it a great vacation novel – not quite as satisfying as a trip to the islands, but not as expensive, either.