More loosely paced than ideal—there are numerous trips and a tiresome number of references to people eating...
For a Louisiana woman–turned–New Yorker, going home to her coastal town means facing an old loss—and finding new possibilities in love and life.
Vashti Alcindor thought she would never return to Catalina Cove after the way the community reacted to her teen pregnancy 16 years ago. But inheriting her aunt's B&B and getting laid off from her job at a Manhattan luxury hotel—all this on the heels of a divorce—lead her back to her roots, and then an unexpected business offer makes her rethink her plan to return to the big city. Vashti's electric attraction to the town’s sheriff, Sawyer Grisham, is another unforeseen complication. The setup is reminiscent of a classic B&B romance à la Nora Roberts. Sawyer is a widowed father, and he (and his daughter, Jade) feels that Vashti is right for him, but she is reluctant to commit to anything that would put her heart at risk and invite gossip. Despite the detailed sex scenes and episodes that show a deepening of Sawyer and Vashti’s connection, Jackson (An Honorable Seduction, 2018, etc.) is veering into women’s fiction territory here. The most intriguing parts of the novel have to do with the revelations about Vashti’s youth and her parents’ meddling in the choices she made and the ripple effects of those actions in her current life. Related to these is the large cast of characters, which not only includes people in the Cove (including some who will become couples in future romances), but also in other states. As the plot inches toward the climax, a huge coincidence threatens to turn the story into a soap opera, but it stops short of treacly melodrama.
More loosely paced than ideal—there are numerous trips and a tiresome number of references to people eating blueberry-infused food—but the heroine’s unusual backstory and the passages on local history and Creole identity add some freshness to this small-town inn-owner romance.Pub Date: Oct. 30, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-335-00564-9
Page Count: 646
Publisher: Harlequin HQN
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2018
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of...
Hoover’s (November 9, 2015, etc.) latest tackles the difficult subject of domestic violence with romantic tenderness and emotional heft.
At first glance, the couple is edgy but cute: Lily Bloom runs a flower shop for people who hate flowers; Ryle Kincaid is a surgeon who says he never wants to get married or have kids. They meet on a rooftop in Boston on the night Ryle loses a patient and Lily attends her abusive father’s funeral. The provocative opening takes a dark turn when Lily receives a warning about Ryle’s intentions from his sister, who becomes Lily’s employee and close friend. Lily swears she’ll never end up in another abusive home, but when Ryle starts to show all the same warning signs that her mother ignored, Lily learns just how hard it is to say goodbye. When Ryle is not in the throes of a jealous rage, his redeeming qualities return, and Lily can justify his behavior: “I think we needed what happened on the stairwell to happen so that I would know his past and we’d be able to work on it together,” she tells herself. Lily marries Ryle hoping the good will outweigh the bad, and the mother-daughter dynamics evolve beautifully as Lily reflects on her childhood with fresh eyes. Diary entries fancifully addressed to TV host Ellen DeGeneres serve as flashbacks to Lily’s teenage years, when she met her first love, Atlas Corrigan, a homeless boy she found squatting in a neighbor’s house. When Atlas turns up in Boston, now a successful chef, he begs Lily to leave Ryle. Despite the better option right in front of her, an unexpected complication forces Lily to cut ties with Atlas, confront Ryle, and try to end the cycle of abuse before it’s too late. The relationships are portrayed with compassion and honesty, and the author’s note at the end that explains Hoover’s personal connection to the subject matter is a must-read.
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of the survivors.Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5011-1036-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Roberts does it again with this fast-paced romantic mystery that's both steamy and thrilling, despite its somewhat obvious...
Beautiful Italian babe with a passion for fire and doomed hunks joins the arson squad and discovers that someone has held a torch for her since she was a child.
When Reena Hale is 11 years old, she watches her family's Baltimore pizzeria go up in flames. Thanks to a local arson detective, John Minger, and the girl's keen memory, police determine that a neighborhood crook whose young son had recently attacked Reena was out for revenge, and soon cops publicly haul the dirt bag off to jail. The large and loving Hale family bands together and rebuilds; Reena grows up curious about the origins of fire. She attends college and, after her boyfriend dies in an accident, joins the police force and learns the inner workings of the fire department. Eventually, she teams with Minger to solve the city's suspicious fires. Meanwhile, over the years, a shady character has been hiding in the shadows, waiting for the right moment to violently sabotage Reena's relationships (usually with the help of explosives). Somehow Reena doesn't put together that all of her boyfriends have been in the path of catastrophic (occasionally deadly) events, so her stalker hits the phone lines to clue her in with dirty messages that become more and more intimate. When Reena launches a torrid love affair with her new neighbor, whose truck soon explodes, she begins to get it. Fearing for her family's safety, Reena reopens past cases and learns that her troubles started when she was a child. The tale builds to a breathless climax as she (literally) races to beat out the flames of one fire before determining where the next one will be set.
Roberts does it again with this fast-paced romantic mystery that's both steamy and thrilling, despite its somewhat obvious nature.Pub Date: Oct. 4, 2005
ISBN: 0-399-15306-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2005
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