Romance

REVIEWS BY SANDY HUSEBY

Nora Roberts' fiery heroine

When an arsonist torched Sirico's, the Hale family's Italian restaurant in Baltimore, Reena Hale's childhood changed forever. As witness to the flames, Reena's quest to become an arson investigator was the core of her identity. While her career goal is direct, her personal life is extremely tangled in Nora Roberts' Blue Smoke. The first man in Reena's life is her dad, Gib, and every man must measure up to him. John Minger, the inspector who becomes her mentor, saw the cop in the child—her logic and observation. Reena's not so lucky with other men. Her first love, Josh, dies in a fire. Another becomes a prime suspect in an arson. Only when she meets the carpenter next door, Bo Goodnight, does Reena begin to realize that someone has stalked her for years, harming people she loves, and it all goes back to that fateful fire at Sirico's. Roberts sets the gold standard in romantic suspense. Blue Smoke is mesmerizing, weaving in multilayered dangers and strong family ties that wrap irresistibly around one's heart. Magnifico!


And that's final

She never imagined she'd drive a minivan. Or have a turn-into-her-mother moment when she refuses her daughter a tattoo. Or have a relationship with a gay friend that is more loving and enduring than her own marriage. Yet it is Michael Angelo at Lily Waters' side as she gives birth, while her soon-to-be-ex-husband, dubbed Spawn of Satan, is busily spawning with another woman. Lily confronts all that and more with indomitable, earnest determination in Erica Orloff's Do They Wear High Heels in Heaven?. When Lily learns she has stage four breast cancer, she takes on the challenge of finding a love match for Michael, so he can give her children a family when she's gone. And even as Michael falls seriously in love for the first time, with George, he cares for Lily with tenderness. Orloff has written an unforgettable celebration of true love between friends and family with compassion, cheekiness and oh-so-much-heart.


Danger on the high seas

Bored with her life as an Albany hairdresser, Crissy Fitzgerald and her friend, Jenny, decide to take the advice of Crissy's client and book a month-long cruise from Athens to Brazil. The exotic change in locale brings out Crissy's deepest desires for adventure, but those yearnings come at a high price in Judith Gould's Dreamboat. Freed from the constraints of ordinary life, Crissy meets three people who play pivotal roles as the boat heads westward. Wealthy shipping heir Mark Vilos seems larger-than-life. Dr. Luca Santo captivates Crissy, but the course of their romance is as turbulent as the undercurrents that swirl around the vessel. Romance novelist Monika Graf adds to the turmoil, plotting conflicts for her fellow passengers that are as emotionally wrenching as those in her fiction, and Crissy is faced with losing Jenny. But it is the dangers Mark and Luca present that provide for the dishiest reading. Mark's obsessions jeopardize Crissy's life, while loving Luca means risking her heart. Gould crafts sophisticated suspense steeped in sizzling passions and heady dangers . . . like Steel on steroids.


The man in the mirror

In honor of Halloween, here's a stand-out entry in the rapidly growing field of paranormal romance, Karen Marie Moning's Spell of the Highlander. Overworked doctoral student Jessica St. James has no life outside her academic environs in Chicago until a mysterious delivery opens a door to a world from a time long past. The Dark Glass, a priceless mirror from the Stone Age with intriguing runes on its ancient frame, draws Jessi into the arms of Cian MacKelter, a Druid imprisoned within it. Summoning him out unleashes denizens with powers that transcend time and mortality. Entranced by the mysterious Highlander, Jessi unites with him against the treachery of Lucan, who must reclaim the mirror in order to survive. Moning blends the reality of modern-day life and the realm of the Druids with a sorcerer's talent. Spellbinding, indeed.


Sandy Huseby writes from Fargo, North Dakota, and lakeside in Minnesota.

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