Morgan maintains her winning combination of small-town tenderness and sexy, wounded heroes.
Everyone thinks soldier Spencer Lang died in action, so when he comes home the day his best friend is marrying the girl of his dreams, things get complicated.
After high school, Spencer joined the Army to escape his brutal uncle and find his way in the world, but he always expected to come back to Snowberry Creek and marry his old friend Callie. All his plans are shot to pieces, though, when he and his unit are attacked in Afghanistan and he’s mistaken for dead. Rescued after his friends were evacuated, none of them got the news that he’s alive, and they’ve been grieving his loss while he’s been recovering. Turns out his Army buddies came to Snowberry Creek to break the news to his loved ones and fell in love with the town—and some of its residents—which makes it even harder for Spencer to settle back in. Support and encouragement comes from Melanie Wolfe, daughter of the family who owns the local factory. Trouble is, the recently deceased Mr. Wolfe practically ran the place into the ground, and Melanie is trying to turn it around. Melanie left town after high school, too, with no plans to ever return, but she always remembered the roguish bad boy who’d never looked twice at her back then, when she was the prim and proper Wolfe daughter. Now she’s back, determined to save the factory and help the boy she used to like, who’s now a man with shadows in his eyes. In the third Snowberry Creek novel, two unlikely hearts wind up on a shared path to healing, and we are charmed by their growing realization that they are just what the other one needs to be happy. Smooth storytelling and engaging secondary characters enhance a satisfying romance.
Morgan maintains her winning combination of small-town tenderness and sexy, wounded heroes.Pub Date: May 6, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-451-41773-2
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Signet Eclipse/NAL
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an...
True love flares between two people, but they find that circumstances always impede it.
On a winter day in London, Laurie spots Jack from her bus home and he sparks a feeling in her so deep that she spends the next year searching for him. Her roommate and best friend, Sarah, is the perfect wing-woman but ultimately—and unknowingly—ends the search by finding Jack and falling for him herself. Laurie’s hasty decision not to tell Sarah is the second painful missed opportunity (after not getting off the bus), but Sarah’s happiness is so important to Laurie that she dedicates ample energy into retraining her heart not to love Jack. Laurie is misguided, but her effort and loyalty spring from a true heart, and she considers her project mostly successful. Perhaps she would have total success, but the fact of the matter is that Jack feels the same deep connection to Laurie. His reasons for not acting on them are less admirable: He likes Sarah and she’s the total package; why would he give that up just because every time he and Laurie have enough time together (and just enough alcohol) they nearly fall into each other’s arms? Laurie finally begins to move on, creating a mostly satisfying life for herself, whereas Jack’s inability to be genuine tortures him and turns him into an ever bigger jerk. Patriarchy—it hurts men, too! There’s no question where the book is going, but the pacing is just right, the tone warm, and the characters sympathetic, even when making dumb decisions.
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an emotional, satisfying read.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-57468-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
To her usual mix of love, mystery, and passion, Roberts (Sanctuary, 1997, etc.)—author of 115 romancers in some 17 years—adds Renaissance art and a decidedly Medici-like family: the Joneses of Maine. Dr. Miranda Jones, nearly six feet with flaming red hair and a glacial reserve, is an archeometrist who specializes in the analyzing and dating of Renaissance bronze sculpture. Miranda hopes to secure a world-class reputation for herself by authenticating a 15th-century statue of the Dark Lady, one of the mistresses of Lorenzo the Magnificent, as the undiscovered work of a young Michelangelo. Miranda's mother, Dr. Elizabeth Standford-Jones, the emotionally remote director of the Standjo art lab in Florence, has summoned her daughter from the family's Victorian cliffside home in Jones Point, Maine, to test the statue. Meanwhile, Miranda's father, equally remote, is an archaeologist who spends more time at his digs than at home. In fact, no one in the Jones family has made a successful run at marriage, a failure that Miranda and her alcoholic brother Andrew call the Jones curse. As for the statue, when it's discovered to be a fake, Miranda sets out to prove that someone stole the original. In this she's helped by gorgeous art thief Ryan Boldari (half-Italian, half-Irish), who's come to Jones Point to steal yet another bronze, which also turns out to be a forgery. Ryan's plan had been to use Miranda as a pawn, but now, naturally, he finds himself falling hard for her. While the two search for bronzes, a standard-issue romance-novel psychotic is stalking them. Most readers will twig to the killer's identity: Here, as always, Roberts's sexual tension is more compelling than her suspense. Perhaps it's time to take a sabbatical from the pink sweatshop and turn her considerable wit and narrative skills to a more original piece of work.
Pub Date: March 23, 1998
ISBN: 0-399-14387-4
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 1998
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