A Wanted Man, Susan Kay Law’s latest, has all the elements of an enjoyable western: a fine-looking cowboy, a sympathetic heroine, plus trains, horses, and an evil villain. All of these elements come together for an entertaining and romantic read. Laura Hamilton, a talented artist, is out on her own for the first time in…
The Irish Devil would have been a lot better if it had not had so many sex scenes. I don’t think there was a chapter where there wasn’t one (or two, or three, or four) sex scenes. After I finished the book, I couldn’t help but think it would have been a marvelous big, juicy…
Normally, I very much enjoy books set in the times when modern America was just shaping up: the combination of cowboys, Indians and military men, and the often rough way of life are enough to form a sizzling basis for a story. However, The Princess and the Wolf not only failed to light a fire…
Harper Allen’s The Man That Got Away is one of the most original debut romances I’ve ever come across, and one of my favorites. A time-travel romance with an unusual setting – 1930s Hollywood – it’s brimming over with creativity, excitement, emotion and a lot of heart. Most of all, it’s just a lot of…
Moon in the Water is an uncommonly lush and lovely historical romance. Most of the story takes place aboard a steamer on the Mississippi River, a very nice setting for the gentle love story that unfolds there. Owning a riverboat seemed like an impossible dream for a steersman like Chase Hardesty. Then James Rossiter, owner…
“A gentleman caller” evokes a myriad of subtle undertones and hidden meanings, but mainly it brings to mind one of the old rites of passage for a well-bred Southern lady. Not only that, it brings to mind all sorts of pleasant connotations of the good ol’ South; magnolia trees, antebellum mansions, delicate ladies who are…
Normally, I love big, gritty historical sagas since they are just the sort of stories that make me want to suspend disbelief and fall into the twists and turns of a larger-than-life epic plot. Crosswinds opens with the promise of just such a story, but, unfortunately, it failed to hold up. As Crosswinds opens it…
Nan Ryan’s latest, Chieftain, features a half-breed Comanche war chief and a free spirit. They meet and fall in love on a reservation (sort of) and run off to be together. While fast-paced, Ryan’s story suffers from a lack of romance, at the very least. Maggie Bankhead is searching for a purpose in life. She…
A man set on nothing less than complete revenge and women caught in the middle take center stage in the ninth title of Susan Edwards’ White series of Indian romances. Rather than the usual mix of a full-Caucasian character falling in love with a full or “half-breed” Indian, Edwards instead offers up the romance bewteen…
Seen By Moonlight by Kathleen Eschenburg features likable protagonists, an unusual plot, a great sense of place and history, and is written in a beautiful style. There’s just one problem: it’s kind of boring. Annabelle Hallston is an unconventional young woman in 1860s Virginia society. When her scholarly father dies, she and her two brothers…