Part thriller and part romance, this quick-read melodrama by Mitchard (the Oprah-anointed The Deep End of the Ocean, 1996) tries to keep quite a few narrative balls in the air, juggling jailhouse love, teen pregnancy, escaped convicts, death row lawyers, biological clocks, and the whole capricious character of the lone star state of Texas. When Arlington Mowbray starts writing to Dillon LeGrande at his current place of residence, the Solamente River Correctional Facility, she doesn’t expect much more than to fulfill a dare. At 14, what Arley, an honor student and track star, doesn’t know about men could fill a book. And when Dillon’s letters begin to arrive, full of poetry and cowboy cordiality, Arley starts to fall in love. She visits him, and the two decide to marry secretly. Which is where Annie Singer, lawyer for a women’s defense organization, comes in, helping Arley arrange for her first conjugal visit with her now husband. After a tender and wild night in a trailer by the prison, Arley discovers that she’s pregnant, is kicked out by her mother, and moves in with Annie and her longtime boyfriend Stuart. Arley’s pregnancy only serves to emphasize the stalemate of Annie’s relationship to Stuart, a death row attorney whose crusades for his clients always take precedence over a private life. When Dillon escapes from jail, Arley is placed in hiding in an isolated cabin, learning only from news broadcasts about the antics of the “Highwayman,” the romantic persona Dillon has created (based on their favorite poem) for himself as he politely plunders the state. Arley waits for him to come and carry her away. Meanwhile, she’s threatened by a forest fire and by the arrival of various violent family members—a crazy sister among them—and is surprised overall by a few too many revelations. A big, readable novel, but also one neither surprising nor penetrating enough to be especially memorable. (Literary Guild main selection; author tour)
Pub Date: June 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-670-87884-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1998
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.
Eleven years ago, he broke her heart. But he doesn’t know why she never forgave him.
Toggling between past and present, two love stories unfold simultaneously. In the first, Macy Sorensen meets and falls in love with the boy next door, Elliot Petropoulos, in the closet of her dad’s vacation home, where they hide out to discuss their favorite books. In the second, Macy is working as a doctor and engaged to a single father, and she hasn’t spoken to Elliot since their breakup. But a chance encounter forces her to confront the truth: what happened to make Macy stop speaking to Elliot? Ultimately, they’re separated not by time or physical remoteness but by emotional distance—Elliot and Macy always kept their relationship casual because they went to different schools. And as a teen, Macy has more to worry about than which girl Elliot is taking to the prom. After losing her mother at a young age, Macy is navigating her teenage years without a female role model, relying on the time-stamped notes her mother left in her father’s care for guidance. In the present day, Macy’s father is dead as well. She throws herself into her work and rarely comes up for air, not even to plan her upcoming wedding. Since Macy is still living with her fiance while grappling with her feelings for Elliot, the flashbacks offer steamy moments, tender revelations, and sweetly awkward confessions while Macy makes peace with her past and decides her future.
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-2801-1
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2018
Heartfelt and funny, this enemies-to-lovers romance shows that the best things in life are all-inclusive and nontransferable...
An unlucky woman finally gets lucky in love on an all-expenses-paid trip to Hawaii.
From getting her hand stuck in a claw machine at age 6 to losing her job, Olive Torres has never felt that luck was on her side. But her fortune changes when she scores a free vacation after her identical twin sister and new brother-in-law get food poisoning at their wedding buffet and are too sick to go on their honeymoon. The only catch is that she’ll have to share the honeymoon suite with her least favorite person—Ethan Thomas, the brother of the groom. To make matters worse, Olive’s new boss and Ethan’s ex-girlfriend show up in Hawaii, forcing them both to pretend to be newlyweds so they don’t blow their cover, as their all-inclusive vacation package is nontransferable and in her sister’s name. Plus, Ethan really wants to save face in front of his ex. The story is told almost exclusively from Olive’s point of view, filtering all communication through her cynical lens until Ethan can win her over (and finally have his say in the epilogue). To get to the happily-ever-after, Ethan doesn’t have to prove to Olive that he can be a better man, only that he was never the jerk she thought he was—for instance, when she thought he was judging her for eating cheese curds, maybe he was actually thinking of asking her out. Blending witty banter with healthy adult communication, the fake newlyweds have real chemistry as they talk it out over snorkeling trips, couples massages, and a few too many tropical drinks to get to the truth—that they’re crazy about each other.
Heartfelt and funny, this enemies-to-lovers romance shows that the best things in life are all-inclusive and nontransferable as well as free.Pub Date: May 14, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5011-2803-5
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2019
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