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

Dear Ms. Melton:

I had read and enjoyed the voice in the first book of yours that I had read and so I was interested in reading the next in the series, Too Far Gone, which picks up where book 2 left off on a couple of secondary characters.

Mother of three, Ellie Stuart, is struggling to go to school and to raise her boys. She rents a home from Navy SEAL Sean Harlan. Harlan is strongly attracted to Ellie but has a no single mother rule because of Harlan’s committment issues.  He is supposed to be a womanizer who enjoys the strings free relationships he has with several woman. For Ellie’s part, she doesn’t believe that strong, gorgeous and together Navy SEAL Harlan would want anything to do with her.  Her three boys get kidnapped and Sean charges in to help. The story then changes to a road romance as the two set off to find her kids.

Once the two start their search for the kidnapped children, the story started losing me.  Ellie and Sean are suspects by those in authority but are not instructed to stay in the area.  Instead, …

Dear Ms. Melton:

You are a new to me author and I had heard good things about you so I was happy to try you out. While this book didn’t work for me, I am still interested in reading other books by you, either future or past works. The main reason that I struggled with this book is that there were so many characters and those characters had all suffered terribly tragedies and one book wasn’t enough to adequately address everything that was brought up.

Ostensibly the main story line is about senior Chief Soloman McGuire and teacher Jordan Bliss. Jordan Bliss was working on the adoption of a young Venezuelan boy when the town she was in was targeted by guerillas. Bliss was saved by McGuire and his team of SEALs sent in specifically to extract her and British civilians. McGuire forces Bliss to leave her nearly adopted son behind because his orders do not include any children. Bliss fights him like a mad woman and eventually she is subdued and sedated. Jordan won’t be deterred and once back in the states, she plots to return to the …

Dear Ms. Leigh:

My friends love you. Generally, I love things my friends love. Unfortunately, the categorical syllogism ends there. While this story features a stronger, more emotionally secure heroine than I have seen in previous Leigh books, the implausability of the plot and the tiresome machinations of the hero left me deflated.

Morganna Chavez has always loved Clint McIntire, her brother’s best friend. For years, however, he’s been seemingly immune to her charms. Seemingly being the operative word. Clint is as attracted to Morganna even before it was appropriate for him to do so. He’s never acted on it because he does not believe he can love anyone given his terrible childhood. However, when Morganna, a newly minted DEA agent, is spotted at one of his favorite BDSM haunts and placed in danger, Clint is forced to confront his feelings for Morganna.

What makes this work, when it does work, is when Morganna is standing up for herself. She knows that Clint is attracted to her and she knows that he fights his attraction. She just doesn’t know the reason. She calls him on his emotional cowardice instead of being hurt …