Josh Dean

It Books, Feb 7 2012, $24.99

ISBN: 9780062020482

Using Jack Australian shepherd and his retinue as a fascinating entrance into the dog show world, Josh Dean writes a delightful look into why so many people invest so much money, emotion and time on these events.  His career starts with Jack appearing to be a future superstar.  Over the year we get to know him and his human team up close and personal as Jack is the ticket to help us on the outside understand what motivates so many people to participate.  This includes the support elements like training, breeding, hairstyling, etc.; as Mr. Dean states that these shows keep some purebred breeds alive.  Occasionally attendees like me see chaos when watching a dog show, but Mr. Dean explains it is very structured and how the lay person can better observe what is going on.  Jack wins first prize as he turns Show Dog: The Charmed Life and Trying Times of a Near-Perfect Purebred into an enjoyable romp.

Harriet Klausner

Jill Shalvis

Harlequin Blaze, Feb 21 2012, $5.25

ISBN: 9780373796731

In Santa Rey, California, Rainey Saunders is the junior sports coordinator at the beleaguered North District Rec Center.  At the same time that Rainey and her BFF Lena run a car wash to raise some funds, on the news the Sacramento Mammoth players and their thirty-four years old coach Mark Diego and the Anaheim Ducks got into a brawl at a seedy bar after the latter team won the Stanley Cup over the former team due to a controversial call.  Lena dates their boss, Mark’s brother Rick’ while Rainey remembers when she was sixteen and offered herself to Mark who rejected his friend’s advances with a life misconduct.

Mark and two of his players arrive at the rec center as the coach and his Ducks’ counterpart make their inane fighters do community service.  Rainey’s seditious heart stops as she knows she still wants the rat, but she never forgave him for the humiliation.  However, as he hangs around coaching the girls’ softball team, he realizes he is in love; she has been in love with him for over a decade.  He plans to score the goal of his life winning the trust of his woman.

This is a charming second chance at love sports romance starring two likable protagonists and a strong support cast especially rec teens at the rec center.  Fans will enjoy this fun tale as Mark prays Rainey will release him from the penalty box so that they can heat the ice with their love.

Harriet Klausner

Jo Leigh

Harlequin Blaze, Feb 21 2012, $5.25

ISBN: 9780373796755

A member of the Manhattan trading card women St. Marks Lunch Exchange, socialite and charity foundation CEO Rebecca Thorpe has tried three hunks but none give her the sizzle.  She sees the card of retired NYPD detective Jake Donnelly, who was injured on the job, and likes what she sees and reads. 

While she is Manhattan and he is Brooklyn, Rebecca and Jake have in common is neither is interested in a long term relationship; both want a one nighter or three.  They have the best sex of their respective lives.  Meanwhile Rebecca targets affluent William West for a large donation to her charity.  Jake is stunned as even with major cosmetic surgery, West appears to be a high roller drug trafficker he busted years ago who vanished while on bail.  Meanwhile he rationalizes why he must stay with this woman he is falling in love with. He needs to keep her safe from a nasty person pretending to be an honest businessman.

The second It’s Trading Men! contemporary romance (see Choose Me) is an enjoyable New York City frolic.  The lead couple seems to be total opposites except in bed as she is a 1% upper class Manhattanite and he is a 99% middle class Brooklynite.  Their romance is wonderfully developed to slowly evolve from just lust with the impetus to keep them together long enough for the evolution to occur coming from West.

Harriet Klausner

Catherine Mann

Berkley, Mar 6 2012, $7.99

ISBN: 9780425246993

Ever since her uncle was murdered in front of her eyes as a child almost two decades ago, Jolynn Taylor stays away from her father’s mob world.  However, when her dad Josiah suffers a heart attack, Jolynn goes to spend some time with him on his “home” a cruise ship the Fortuna currently docked in Genoa.

In Nellis AFB, although it rips at his soul, Captain Chuck Tanaka informs his superior officer Colonel Scanlon that he lost his edge since the enemy tortured him.  Scanlon says instead of a desk job until his Air Force commitment ends, Chuck will go undercover as a blackjack dealer on the Fortuna with the chance to destroy the terrorist cell that kidnapped him and other military members.  Scanlon and “Ice” Berg have his back.  His assignment is to get close to the daughter.  After a klutzy introduction, Chuck realizes someone wants Jolynn dead.  Attracted to her, Chuck breaks cover to protect her.

The latest Dark Ops romantic suspense is a terrific thriller in which the need to protect the damsel in distress supersedes the romances (Scanlon meets his woman too).  The storyline is fast-paced from the first clumsy move until the final confrontation.  This is another winner with readers anticipating the melting of Ice soon.

Harriet Klausner

Lynn Viehl

Signet, Mar 6 2012, $7.99

ISBN: 9780451413215

The High Lord of the Immortal Darkyn wants the alleged scrolls that contain the secrets to immortal life and the maps that lead to Templar treasure buried in the early fourteenth century.  He sends his best warrior Korvel to France to obtain the scrolls. 

As he drives the worst road in France, Korvel is warned others are making an attempt too.  Soon he is attacked and hurt, but defeats his enemy, but is aware more await him.  His quest leads Korvel to Simone, the daughter of the scroll’s guardian.  She seeks them too in order to return them to safety.  As they team up with killers pursuing them, they begin to fall in love, but Simone fails to inform her new partner that once she obtains the scrolls, she is to kill Korvel.

The first Lords of the Darkyn romantic urban fantasy is a great entry inside the magnificent mythological world of Lynn Viehl.  The storyline is fast-paced from the first assassination attempt until the final confrontation as readers will wonder whether Simone will complete the mission as ordered.  Fast-paced, fans will appreciate the opening act in the new trilogy due to the strong protagonists who make the Viehl realm exciting to visit.

Harriet Klausner

Andrea Cremer

Philomel, Jan 3 2012, $18.99

ISBN: 9780399256127

Bellicose Calla knows if she is to be the Alpha of her pack, she must prove her leadership skills in combat and choose a mate.  Ren and Shay vie to be that male.  However, Calla makes it clear to both competitors and her pack she will not select anyone until the Keepers and their magic are defeated.

Calla also shows her loyalty when she protects her brother Ansrel, stripped of his essence, from those who want to kill him for being a traitor.  However, it is what she prays is the final battle that she focuses on; a war Calla does not expect to survive and if she does she knows she will live with regret of having led brave warriors to their deaths; though she feels she had no choice.

The final Nightshade fantasy (see Nightshade and Wolfsbane) is an exciting thriller starring a heroine who was forced to detach her feelings for others in order to lead her side in war as she knows she will leave brothers and sisters in arms dead and maimed.  A stunning twist adds to the realism that people die in war.  Andrea Cremer provides a shocking but strong finish to an intriguing trilogy.

Harriet Klausner

Christine Trent

Kensington, Feb 1 2012, $15.00

ISBN: 9780758265906

In 1812 Leeds, Annabelle Stirling runs her successful cloth making dress shop.  Her wastrel brother Wesley and her fiancé Clive Pryce join the Luddites who destroy her new gig machine as immoral.  Angry at the double betrayal and believing the Luddites worked for her rivals, Belle demands the authorities do something; they ignore her rants.

Fuming, she heads to London to make her case with the leadership, but the Prince Regent who she meets acts no differently than what she met in Leeds.  Architect John Nash takes her under his wings as his mentee while she and cabinet maker Putnam Boyce are attracted to one another. Meanwhile Wesley gets involved with a high level assassin abduction plan.

The latest Christine Trent historical (see A Royal Likeness and The Queen’s Dollmaker) is an engaging Regency story starring a likable protagonist who enjoys her shop vocation; which makes the twin betrayals that much more hurtful.  The storyline is driven by undeterred Belle’s need for retribution as she makes a wonderful lead holding the plot together.  While the Luddite movement anchors time and place, other historical facts slow down what is overall a strong early nineteenth century tale.

Harriet Klausner

Kate Lloyd

David C. Cooke, Mar 1 2012, $14.99

ISBN: 9780781405089

In Seattle, Esther informs her thirty something daughter Holly that she received a letter from her grandma begging for her to come home as she needs her.  Holly, whose dad died in Vietnam, is a bit taken aback with the news as Grandma Anna is dead.  She is even more stunned when her mom sadly says she will hate her.  Esther tells Holly, who she knew desperately wanted relatives for years that she lied to her all her life; her mother and her brothers still live in the Lancaster area. 

Her BFF Dori agrees to manage Esther’s Amish Shoppe while mother and daughter are away as reluctantly Esther decides to go home to Lancaster County.  Holly accompanies her as she wants to meet her grandma, her five uncles and aunts and cousins.  They stop at the home of Mennonite Beth Fleming before finally meeting the family.  Ass Holly enjoys her time with her kin; she meets and falls in love with Beth’s son Zach.

This is a wonderful refreshing Amish tale that focuses on the complications of second chances.  Esther makes the tale work with her trepidation of seeing her mom and brothers (who are all heading to Big Sky Country) after abandoning her family, her community, her religion and her lifestyle decades ago.  She prays for forgiveness from her kin especially her Mommy Anna and her daughter.  Readers will relish the prodigal child’s return accompanied by her adult offspring.

Harriet Klausner

Cindi Myers

Bell Bridge, Jan 2012, $15.95

ISBN: 9781466473461

In 1864 Missouri, a fire and brimstone Methodist Minister’s daughter Zeralda Mimms and her cousin Quantrill’s Raider Jesse James meet at the wedding of her older sister Lucy to Bowling Browder.  Each is attracted to one another and he boldly kisses her.  Jesse returns to the fighting.  When the war ends, wounded Jesse goes to Zee’s home to heal.  As she nurses him back to health, they fall in love.  They become engaged and she learns her future husband is a robber and rumored to be a cold blooded killer.  She prays that their marriage and their children will straighten out her beloved husband, but that hope is not answered.

The Woman Who Loved Jesse James is a fascinating biographical fiction that looks at the famous outlaw through the eyes of mostly his adulating beloved wife in a world still suffering from the ravages of the war and the consequential agony of defeat.  Because of Zee’s loving filter, Jesse comes across as heroic rather than a cold blooded killer.  She needs to believe in the goodness rather than the wickedness of her mate who she knows is tender with his family.  Well written, readers will enjoy Cindi Myers fine nineteenth century look at Jesse James through his spouse’s loving perspective.

Harriet Klausner

Lee Hollis

Kensington, Mar 1 2012, $7.99

ISBN: 9780758267375

In Bar Harbor, Maine, Island Times Editor in Chief Sal Moretti offers his office manager single mom (of fifteen year old Gemma and thirteen years old Dustin) Hayley Powell the position of writing the food and wine column with the nonagenarian reporter retiring.  She agrees and her column proves successful with its unpretentious Maine earthiness, which angers her rival at the Bar Harbor Herald prim and proper British aristocratic Karen Applebaum.

However, Karen is found dead with her face buried in a bowl of Hayley’s clam chowder.  The police consider Hayley their only suspect and soon Officers Earl and Haley arrest her.  She makes bail and with her BFFs investigates the Death of a Kitchen Diva.

This is an amusing culinary amateur sleuth starring a delightful beleaguered protagonist.  The breezy storyline is fun to follow as the war of the recipes turns deadly.  Although the sub-genre is loaded with similar entries (see Diane Mott Davidson), sub-genre fans will enjoy this entertaining regional whodunit as Haley seeks out a cold blooded killer whose recipe includes the soccer mom taking the fall.

Harriet Klausner