Why not just tie her to a chair in the same room as the Meth heads? Or why wouldn’t they try to secure her in some fashion? Why would Meth 1 think that he could get away with raping Lolly when his girlfriend was standing right there? Did he have a history of this? Was it simply to place Lolly in further sympathy with the reader? When they put Lolly in a room upstairs, it easily allows her to escape. For example, meth addict 1 is male and tries to rape Lolly only his girlfriend, Meth 2, comes in and starts to beat Meth 1 about the head. no matter how hard you had Lolly explain everything to me, I was beset with questions regarding the plausibility of the suspense. It’s about the time when the meth addicts appear on the scene that the book kind of falls apart for me, maybe because I was hoping and anticipating Lolly and Gabriel interaction. Her return to town is cut short when two meth addicts break into her home and prepare to rape, rob, and kill her. She heads back up the mountain to get the supplies she needs. The local grocery store owner invites Lolly to stay with them over the icestrom and Lolly acquiesces. Her parents have moved south and Lolly doesn’t live in the area. Lolly is preparing the family home for sale. Still, Gabriel isn’t going to refuse to do what his father asks and heads up the mountain. Him! The highschool jock, son of the sheriff, friend to everyone yet Lolly was always using her sharp tongue to cut him down. When they were in high school, Lolly always looked down her nose at him. He wants to spend the afternoon with his son and he doesn’t really like Lolly. Gabriel is not thrilled about his father’s assignment. His father, the local sheriff, sends him to retrieve Lolly Helton from her mountain home because she won’t be able to survive up there if there is an icestorm. There is an impending icestorm and military policeman, Gabriel, is home on leave. The story takes place, mostly, over the space of one afternoon. However, in keeping with your current writing voice, this book is far more focused on the action/suspense than it is on the characters and their relationship with each other.

The first and second chapters read like a vintage category Howard romance and if it had kept in that vein, I would have been able to recommend this unreservedly. I know that I would have paid quite a bit to read the Diamond Bay trilogy because it was so good. A good category length Howard is worth hardcover pricing. When I started ICE, I began to get excited. Those have sold like crazy so I guess that readers are unfazed by the length of the story and the cost. I remember thinking unkind thoughts about this format when Janet Evanovich put out her first Christmas hardcover. I confess that I was at first taken aback by the length of this hardcover.

Jane C Reviews / C Reviews Category cabin romance / Linda-Howard / romantic-suspense 16 Comments

Diamond bay by linda howard