Dear Author: Romance Novel Reviews, Industry News, and Commentary

Dear Ms. Holquist:

I almost didn’t write this review because it was such a struggle for me to pinpoint why I didn’t respond well to it given that I liked The Sexiest Man Alive so much. Ultimately, I think I failed to connect to the hero and heroine in a “it’s not you, it’s me” manner.

Amy Burns is a psychic who went on to Oprah to reveal Oprah’s one true love. Unfortunately, Amy and her psychic voice Maddie have had some communication problems of late and just when Amy needs her (in front a live Oprah audience), Maddie decides to stop talking to Amy altogether. Amy’s goal, notwithstanding her humiliation in front of Oprah, is to find Maddie.

Amy tracks Maddie to a gypsy named Roni to a restaurant in Philly called Les Fleurs. There she finds the hot chef/owner James LaChance but no Roni. Amy expends a huge amount of effort to find Roni which is extraordinary in that Amy’s only other huge expenditure of effort in the past is related to doing nothing, being a ne’er do well.

James LaChance’s claim to fame, other than his …

Dear Ms. Greiman:

I have never read a Greiman book before. I always meant to read and have, in fact, purchased your contemporary books, Unzipped and Unplugged before. But with the muscle bound chests and arms and titles with “Highlander”, I wasn’t terribly excited about reading the historicals. As I said a few days ago, I kind of feel that my Scottish historical days are past. My blogging partner, Jayne, puts her Scottish malaise down to too many book with faux Scottish dialect but this is a book I would recommend to her and, in fact, I am going to send this to her.

While there is plenty of dialect in this book, none of its seems faux. In fact, its downright lyrical. I loved the speech patterns of the characters that held true not only in their conversations with each other but in their own internal dialogue.

“I did na ken what I was doing.” And that was the bloody truth. “I swear to the saints. I did na ken. And I was hungry. ‘Twas three days …

Dear Ms. Enoch:

It is always very difficult to live up to one’s own hype. The Sins of a Duke is the fourth and final entry in the Sin series. I have read two of the previous three. In the previous stories, Sebastian, the eldest brother, has played a large role. He was a strong and influential member of his family, as well as a powerful man of England.

He had lost his wife a few years ago and has been raising his daughter by himself. He’s much used to responsibility, having inherited the dukedom at age seventeen. The novel opens well enough with Sebastian acting every inch the autocratic lord that he is, displaying political savvy and usefulness to the crown. He’s portrayed as an attentive father and a good brother as well as one who is subconsciously is missing something in his life.

Enter Josefina Katarina Embry. Josefina is the daughter of the Rey of Costa Habichuela, a country on the coast of South America. Her family is in London to gain financial and political support from the crown. Instead of getting the Bank of London to …