Return to Paradise
Grade : F

This book didn't seem like a romance at all. It resembled a group of separate, mostly unromantic, stories loosely connected by some of the worst characters and dialogue ever to grace the romantic fiction genre.

Kate McClure and Hank Sinclair meet when Hank accuses Kate and her mother of moving into a house that he mistakenly thought he owned. To discuss their relationship at any length would be to accord it the very importance it lacked in the book itself. There were so many other relationships going on besides theirs, that it got lost in the shuffle. In addition, it's hard to tell Kate and Hank are supposed to be lovers because they spend hardly any time together. A major plot faux pas has Kate stranded for two days but not with Hank - duh? Her companion during this time is the man who is actually Hank's rival for Kate's affection. In fact, Kate spent so much time with this other man that it got to be confusing as to was the actual hero of this story.

It is a wonder Kate ever found anything to love about Hank Sinclair anyway. He accuses her several times of being sexually repressed and tells her that having a little sex might be just the thing she needs to loosen-up. Nice guy, huh?

Kate and Hank actually have their very own little stranded scene in which Hank must minister to Kate after she has been knocked from her horse, which was spooked during an electrical storm. As they hole up in the ubiquitous line shack, he utters one of the strangest lines ever used by a man desperate to get a woman into the sack. He tells her, "Take off the wet clothes, and use the water in that can to wash up, or I'll strip you myself, and scrub you down with a corn cob." That Hank - What a charmer!

Kate could best be described as a southern belle gone bad. She excelled at being whiny and irritatingly juvenile. She also had a penchant for saying, "Mamma, don't swear," with extremely annoying frequency. Apparently, her mamma said damn too many times for Kate's sweet little ears.

It is too bad Kate comes across as immature, and Hank as a sexual deviant, because the one redeeming quality of this book is that it features a mature couple. In their late forties and early fifties, Kate and Hank could have set an important precedent for romantic fiction. Books like this need to be out there, it's just that they need to be good books.

This book doesn't resemble a finished product so much as a work very much still in progress. Just as two many cooks can spoil the broth, too much going on in a story can ruin it. That's what happened with this book.

Reviewed by Anne Ritter
Grade : F

Sensuality: Warm

Review Date : May 6, 1998

Publication Date: 1998

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