Dear Author: Romance Book Reviews, Author Interviews, and Commentary

Dear Mr. Capella,

Whereas “The Wedding Officer” was a mix of historical and romance, “The Various Flavors of Coffee” is more historical with some romance and that not very satisfying to me. Yes, yes I should be reviewing what’s actually there and not what I wanted to be there but….

Robert Wallis changes as he matures and just as the initial chapter of the book promises us. There was much about him in his youth that I didn’t particularly care for. He drank, he took drugs, he visited prostitutes, he didn’t want to work and frankly was looking for the easy way out. Yet as he says, none of this was illegal then and much was treated as normal for him as a man and as an artiste. Strange that as the restraints of the Victorian Age were cast aside for the bawdiness of the Edwardian Age, Robert becomes more circumspect. The various flavors of coffee can be likened to the various flavors of love. Robert loves three women - three very different women. One used him, one stayed his friend and one became his lifelong love.

The construction of the Wallis-Pinker …

Dear Mr. Capella,

I’m so glad your editor persuaded you to write this book. And for the positive buzz at various other romance review sites that brought it to my attention. I’ve also heard that it’s already been optioned for a movie and after reading it, I can see why. The descriptions of Italy and Naples put the reader right on the scene, the characters (even the secondary ones) are three dimensional, the humor is delightful yet you manage to convey what war was doing to these people and this country. It also brought to mind something I read while preparing an Advanced American History report when I was in high school. One British general is said to have remarked about the mingling of soldiers and prostitutes of Naples, “Some of you chaps stick your privates in places that I wouldn’t even put the ferrule of my umbrella.”

Captain James Gould arrives in wartime Naples assigned to discourage marriages between British soldiers and their gorgeous Italian girlfriends. But the innocent young officer is soon distracted by an intoxicating young widow …