Not quite an award-winning stallion, but the plot gallops along at a steady pace, making for an entertaining light read.
From Golden Heart finalist Pettersen (Fillies and Females, 2011, etc.) comes the story of a poverty-stricken horse masseuse and the brash, wealthy new boss she falls in love with.
Jenna Murphy’s life is turned upside down once Derek Burke comes to town. Although she’s far from financially well-off, her job as a horse masseuse at the Three Brooks Equine Center provides her with just enough income. But when out-of-towner Derek buys out the Center, Jenna’s job and heart are both at risk. Derek decides to make some big changes, including the removal of anyone who drains company resources. Between Jenna’s lack of formal education and the lies she tells to cover her tracks, it’s little wonder she feels unnerved. It’s curious, though that she’s willing to accept the man who could possibly ruin her life. Even though she hesitates to fall in love, she welcomes his sexual advances. Her physical attraction is understandable, but letting someone so disruptive into her bed seems like a disaster waiting to happen. Raised by an abusive father and a mother who obsessed over him, Jenna has a strong desire to keep herself from falling in love and thereby repeating her mother’s mistakes. This background makes Jenna a believable character whom readers will hope can be happy; it also makes her dependency on Derek slightly odd. Falling for Derek would be a bit more understandable if he were more developed: He’s little more than a cookie-cutter hero, the handsome yet ruthless businessman who has a soft spot for the heroine. Moreover, the jump from attraction to love happens rather quickly, making it difficult to track the buildup of emotions. Fortunately, the rest of the book’s pacing is spot-on. The harder Jenna tries to hide the truth about her background and her after-hours use of the Center’s facilities, the more the reader anticipates a big conflict on the couple’s road to happiness. There are also plenty of clues to suggest that danger is lurking around the bend for the Center, and the resolution doesn’t disappoint.
Not quite an award-winning stallion, but the plot gallops along at a steady pace, making for an entertaining light read.Pub Date: May 12, 2012
ISBN: 978-0987671783
Page Count: 284
Publisher: Westerhall
Review Posted Online: Sept. 18, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
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