Token by Beverley Kendall BLOG TOUR #Token #BeverleyKendall @simonschusterUK @TeamBATC #BookReview

 

Kennedy Mitchell is brilliant, beautiful and tired of being the only Black woman in the room.

Two years ago, she was plucked from reception for a seat at the boardroom table in the name of “representation”.

Rather than play along, she and her best friend founded Token, a boutique PR agency that helps diversity-challenged companies and celebrities. 

With famous people getting into reputation-damaging controversies, Token is in high demand and business is booming, but when her ex shows up needing help repairing his reputation, things get even more complicated and soon Kennedy finds herself drawn into a PR scandal of her own.

Token by Beverley Kendall is published today, 15 February 2024 by Simon and Schuster. My thanks to the publisher who sent my copy for review as part of this Blog Tour 

I have thoroughly enjoyed my time with Kennedy Mitchell and her best friend Aurora. This novel is a little different to those that I'd usually pick up. However, it's been a blast. It is well written, a mix of romance, current issues, a smattering of spicy sex and a serious look at the behaviours of those who often have the most power. 

Kennedy Mitchell is from a working class background. She worked hard, gained a scholarship to an Ivy League university, came out with a first class degree and has recently been made redundant. She's passing her time working as a temporary receptionist for a large clothing company. When she is summoned to the office of the CEO, she is amazed to be offered a huge amount of money to enable the company to secure a wealthy, famous client. The company wants Kennedy to be a token. They need a black face in the meeting, someone who can prove that they are a diverse organisation, modern thinking and fair. Except, they are not. There are no Black people in senior management, and very few women work in high positions either. 

Kennedy is a woman who is devoted to  fairness and demands respect. She is committed to changing the way that organisations work. 

This episode spurs Kennedy and her white best friend Aurora to form their own agency, ironically called Token. 

Three years later and Token is going from strength to strength, albeit in a slightly different way to how the women originally imagined. Kennedy has become a respected figure, she's able to get companies out of a fix, and at the same time, she and her agency deliver diversity training, with the hope, that eventually, the glass ceiling for both women and people of colour will be smashed. 

When Aurora's billionaire tech-company owner brother Nate finds himself in the midst of a lawsuit, it is Kennedy that he approaches. Nate and Kennedy have history and it soon becomes clear that there's an attraction still simmering between them. Given this, and his relationship to Aurora, it is Kennedy's first inclination to say no, they can't help him. However, things take a different turn and Kennedy soon finds herself well entrenched in Nate's life. 

Whilst I do question some of the Kennedy's business practices, I totally understand her reason for how she worked. She's basically a good, kind woman who hates to see so many inequalities in the workplace, and is determined to make change. As a fifty-seven year old white woman, I can't personally relate to the experiences that Kennedy and many other characters in this novel experience, but my life experience has allowed me to see and hear such things happening to others, and it boils my blood. We are told that those days are gone, but in reality, we know for sure that these things happen. The author incorporates her messages into this novel so well, it's a fun read at times, a little hot at others, but always deals sensitively with the issues that arise. 

A fascinating and fun look at the world of business in New York, combined with the glamour that goes with it and the people who will stop at nothing to get what they want. Recommended. 

Beverley discovered her love of books while growing up in, the then, small city of Barrie,
Ontario Canada. 

With her love of books and romance, she always wished that everyone would find their happily ever after. 

She currently writes sexy historical, new adult and contemporary romances.  

As the mother of one too bright and mischievous young boy, she pulls full-time duty on all fronts. 

When she's not writing full-time, running The Season review website or mothering, she's probably reading or sleeping and dreaming of a time when she'll have time for her favorite hobbies: knitting, crocheting and sewing.  

Beverley has lived on two continents, in three countries, two provinces, and four states. She stopped her nomadic existence and settled in the southeast. 

All things artistic feed her creative passion, but none more than writing. 

Readers can visit her at: beverleykendall.com.

Connect with her on Facebook - http://on.fb.me/1kMOzbK