REVIEWS BY SANDY HUSEBY
A chance encounter during an English snowstorm casts two travelers into each other's arms, and indelibly into each other's hearts in Mary Balogh's new Regency romance, Simply Unforgettable. Frances Allard works hard at her demure schoolteacher image, worried that her shady songstress past will catch up with her. When Lucius Marshall swoops into her life during a snowstorm, their time together in a rustic country inn is a wonderful interlude of snowmen and waltzing to the music they make together. But Lucius, Viscount Sinclair, cannot put out of his mind the magic Frances brings into his life. He promised his family he would find a bride, but she's far from meeting acceptable standards. Believing she is acting in his best interests, Frances rebuffs him repeatedly while he stubbornly overcomes challenge after challenge. Balogh's sprightly and sensual story of love at its Cinderella best is a delightful adventure that will keep readers entranced from page one.
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Carry on, Camelot
When Elen's mother tries to bridge the powerful hatreds driving Urien against King Arthur, a bloodbath ensues and leaves Elen to fill her mother's brave roles. In Sarah Zettel's compelling tale, For Camelot's Honor, Elen's skills at midwifery are tested when she seeks out Arthur to avenge the brutal killing of her mother and the devastation of the family's holdings. Urien has a strong ally and lover in Morgaine, and she has her own agenda against Arthur. Together with Sir Geraint, Elen seeks a weapon powerful enough for such formidable adversaries and faces tests of her own honor. For Camelot's Honor is fantasy that sings with noble courage worthy of the gods within the hearts of women unafraid to bloody their hands with birth and death.
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Family ties
Take your average overachieving yuppie couple with the obligatory two gorgeous girls and add a seemingly dotty aunt and, wait, what's this? An ageless demon named Asteroth seems determined to draw daughter Julia into his influence and far, far back in time. Jill Morrow's The Open Channel is a zesty and fascinating pastiche of good vs. evil between the Middle Ages and the 21st century. Fifteen years before, restaurateur father Stephen and lawyer mother Kat faced their own demons, and now Aunt Francesca's back to warn them that they haven't put that past behind them after all. Their Child of Light is now in mortal and immortal danger. Jill Morrow weaves a tapestry of demonic dangers that only one force can conquer—the abiding power of a mother's love for her child. The Open Channel is a romping good, heart-pounding page-turner.
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Shadowy secrets unveiled
When a man has secrets that compel him to a reclusive life, only a brooding manor house will do—and with it, a ray of sunshine in the form of a lively woman who must break through his personal shadows to set him free. Such is the fascination of Raeburn Court, where the plans of Byron Stratford, Duke of Raeburn, to exact revenge against her wastrel brother, Jack, are thwarted by the wiles and wisdom of Lady Victoria Wakefield. Lydia Joyce's The Veil of Night is a worthy sojourn amid nocturnal secrets and passions where the treat is more potent for the duel of wits and wills than the revelations.
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Sandy Huseby writes from her homes in Fargo, North Dakota, and lakeside in northern Minnesota.
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