Smoothly written, with appealing characters and an engaging storyline, this will surely be a winner with romance fans.
After a professional tragedy, Gabi Romano can’t decide what to do next and escapes winter in Eternity Springs, Colo., for a temporary dogsitting job in the Caribbean.
Gabi is drifting. After a justified shooting as a sheriff’s deputy, she has no desire to return to that life, nor does she want to help out in her mother’s bed-and-breakfast forever. Ready for a change, she winds up watching puppy Bismarck on exclusive Bella Vita Isle. She soon meets Flynn, the hot pool guy next door, and Cicero, the local glass genius. After spending time with Flynn, she realizes he's more than just a pool guy—and he definitely harbors some secrets—but he's gentlemanly and easygoing, and she's far too immersed in her new life studying the craft of glass blowing with Cicero to worry. Feeling as if she’s finally found her purpose, Gabi spends hours a day at the studio, then relaxes in the evenings with her sexy neighbor. Everything comes crashing down on their idyllic existence, however, when they take a sailing excursion and are violently attacked. In the aftermath, Gabi learns the truth about Flynn’s past and rejects him. She returns to Colorado and distances herself emotionally from her time on Bella Vita. However, the following Christmas, she learns that Flynn is in Eternity Springs, in desperate need of healing, and wonders if maybe she’s overlooked an important aspect of her life’s purpose. In the eighth Eternity Springs novel, March continues her best-selling combination of romance and suspense with hints of angelic intervention, and for the most part, everything works, with a few minor misses (e.g. Gabi moves too quickly and glibly away from Flynn, the feel of deus ex machina is occasionally too strong, and sometimes the various tones of the storytelling seem dissonant).
Smoothly written, with appealing characters and an engaging storyline, this will surely be a winner with romance fans.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-345-54230-4
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
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
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
