The Ballerina and the Sheriff

I'm not sure why I chose to review for AAR Slow Dance with the Sheriff by Nikki Logan.  In it, two people who've fled New York City for Larkville, Texas, after being scarred by traumatic occurrences are drawn together.  They both resist the pull, but in the end come together.  This is a romance, after all.

Logan writes some truly inspired scenes in the book, one of which has stayed with me all these weeks after having finished reading and reviewing it.  Jed, the sheriff, takes former ballerina Ellie to see bats leave their cave at dusk.  As she watches them soar, she starts moving and finds her joy in movement that she lost right before she came to Texas.  It's a lovely scene in which readers get to experience broken Jed give Ellie a gift that's more priceless than any he could buy her in a store.

It's scenes like that that make me feel wonderful and are found so rarely in other genres.  Romance, I've found, doesn't necessarily have anything to do with sex, but rather how we interact with others on a personal level.  Standing in the near dark and holding another person's hand as bats fly from a cave isn't sexy, but it's pure love.

The Strong Silent Type -- Yippee!

After suffering through Emma Lang's Matthew, I'm not sure why I picked Brody to review.  But I'm sure glad I did!

Brody would be a real trial for any woman since he doesn't speak much and when he does he's pretty much barking orders that he expects to be obeyed immediately.  Getting him to treat a woman better than a dog would be a challenge.

Fortunately, tough as nails Olivia is up to the task.  She has none of the girly wiles that Brody has seen used over and over again.  Olivia will never want a piano in her parlour unless she plays the piano and enjoys it.  She will never ask Brody to do something impossible to prove that he loves her.  She's practical and down-to-earth, just what's needed in the Wild West.

Reading how these two get together was a joy that I'm really happy to pass along in my AAR review today.  I just hope the rest of Emma Lang's books live up to this one.

Fight, Bicker, Love

I've never been a fan of romances in which the couple bicker and fight their way to "love."  Love, to me, is a much more peaceful emotion, not one in which the participants must be combatants.  Obviously, this isn't true of other readers.  Some like the barbed by-play followed by bedroom moments. 

For those who do, Kate Angell's No Tan Lines, which is reviewed on AAR today, might be a keeper.  I gave it a low B grade because Angell's a slick writer, who's easy to read.  It's not until I stopped to review the book and had to come up with a plot synopsis that I realized how much of the book was sniping and angling by the couple.

Seems to me that there's enough sniping and angling in the day-to-day world that there should be a respite somewhere.  To my mind, love is kinder and gentler.  If it isn't and physical chemistry is the only thing the couple has going, is it really love?  Or is it just sex?

Fortunately, the couple in Angell's book share so many other traits that believing that they are in love isn't difficult.  What strains credulity is their attraction in the first place.

Great Scenery, But No Romance

After reading the first book in Linda Lael Miller's new Western romance series, Big Sky Country (reviewed today at AAR), I'm starting to wonder what's going on with Miller.  Or maybe I should wonder what's going on with me.

I once loved Miller's Westerns.  The men were bigger than life, but totally committed to family.  These are men who live in an unforgiving climate and are often just as unforgiving in their personal lives.  That rigidity often leads to disputes.  Although many of them feud with their relatives, blood is definitely thicker than water.

So I expect a lot from a Miller book.  When I read a book like Big Sky in which the romance of the West settles more between a young man and his teenage stepdaughter and not with the young woman love interest, I've got to wonder what kind of message Miller's trying to give.

Harlequin, however, may not edit Miller as heavily as it once did, but it sure does her proud on the covers it gives her.  Now all I want is for Miller to get back in the saddle romance-wise and deliver a rodeo as entertaining and satisfying as her old novels were.