Reading order
| # | Title | Published | Author | Buy on Amazon |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bad Boys Online | 2003 | Erin McCarthy | N/A |
| 2 | Hard Line | 2003 | Erin McCarthy | Buy |
| 3 | Hard Drive | 2003 | Erin McCarthy | Buy |
| 4 | Hard Bargain | 2003 | Erin McCarthy | Buy |
The Bad Boys Online series by Erin McCarthy was one of her earliest published works, arriving in 2003 when online dating was still a relatively new phenomenon. The series plays with the idea of meeting someone through a screen and discovering that the person on the other end is not quite who you expected.
Each book features a self-contained romance built around the tension between online personas and real-life attraction. The “Hard” titles (Hard Line, Hard Drive, Hard Bargain) were originally published as individual novellas, giving them a tight, fast-paced feel. McCarthy’s humor and knack for witty dialogue are on full display even in this early work.
The series captures a specific moment in early-2000s dating culture and wraps it in the kind of fun, flirty storytelling that would become McCarthy’s trademark across her later, longer series.