Review - - Forget Me Not

Forget Me Not
by Brenda Jackson
Catalina Cove - Book 2
Publisher: HQN
Release Date: March 26, 2019
Reviewed by PJ

Ashley Ryan never doubted that her husband, Devon, was the love of her life. Even now, three years after Devon died in a car wreck while on a business trip, Ashley can’t bring herself to move on. But when her girlfriends surprise her with a getaway to beautiful Catalina Cove, Louisiana, she gets the shock of her life when she encounters a man—bearded, more rugged than before, but unmistakably her Devon.

“Ray Sullivan” moved to this quiet coastal town after waking up in a hospital with amnesia. Haunted by a life he can’t remember, he’s built walls around his heart and a quiet life running boat tours—a life that includes no recollection of Ashley, a woman he suddenly finds himself irresistibly drawn to.

Doctors warn Ashley of the danger in forcing her husband to remember the past. Though she longs to tell him the truth, she finds herself falling all over again for a man she knows may never truly come back to her. In this place where healing and second chances are just a heartbeat away, can love take root once more?

My thoughts:

I have fallen in love with Brenda Jackson's Catalina Cove. I want to travel to Louisiana, book a room at Vashti's B&B, take a tour on Ray's boat, walk the beach, sample the fresh seafood, and get to know the intriguing people who populate this small southern town that Jackson's brought to life on the pages of this series. 

Though I would never want to experience it myself, I admit, I'm a pushover for an amnesia romance and Jackson has created one that pushed all my emotional buttons. My heart was with Ashley as, three years after her husband's death, she's still struggling to harness her grief and move on. Having her mother shove "new husband" candidates at her certainly isn't helping. Discovering her dead husband is very much alive but has no memory of his life before the accident creates a delicate line she must walk and I was with her every step of the way. Jackson kept my emotions bouncing as I was immersed into Ashley's thoughts, fears, and hopes during her gradual and realistically depicted journey as she begins to learn about this new version of the man she married. 

Ray's actions and reactions felt very real to me. I enjoyed his friendship with Sawyer and Kaegan. I understood his reluctance to get involved with a woman, not knowing what his life had been pre-amnesia. Jackson skillfully guides him through the ups and downs of his journey with Ashley with  heart-tugging emotion and realistic reticence. As Devon is slowly revealed through flashbacks and through Ashley's thoughts, we begin to know the man he once was. At the same time, through his present-day interactions with Ashley, both she and the reader come to know Ray as he is now. My heart ached for what Ray has, and continues, to go through. I can't imagine how difficult it must be to know you had a life, friends, family, but remember nothing about it. 

Will Devon regain his memory and return to the wife he once loved? Will Ashley fall in love with Ray, who is very different from Devon, and move forward in a new relationship with the man to whom she's already married? Or will the resolution of this story be something else entirely? You're going to have to travel to Catalina Cove through the pages Forget Me Not to discover the answers. It's a journey I enthusiastically recommend.


What setting (city, state, country) have you discovered in a romance novel that you'd love to visit in real life?

Forget Me Not is Brenda Jackson's 100th Harlequin novel. Have you read her books yet? Do you have a favorite?

One person who posts a comment before 11:00 PM, March 29 will receive a signed, print copy of a Brenda Jackson book. (I don't know which book yet as I'll be buying it at next week's Avon KissCon event.)  
U.S. addresses only.

Heather Ashby Winner

Thanks to everyone who stopped by to visit with Heather Ashby.  

The randomly selected winner of a copy of Heather's Forget Me Not is:

Gwen Hernandez

Congratulations, Gwen!  Please send your full name and mailing address to us at

theromancedish (at) gmail (dot) com

Today's Special - - Heather Ashby

We're delighted to welcome military romance author Heather Ashby back to the Romance Dish.  Heather is a Navy veteran who taught school and raised a family while accompanying her Navy husband around the United States, Japan, and the Middle East. In gratitude for her Army son’s safe return from Afghanistan and Iraq, she now writes military romance novels, donating half her royalties to causes that support wounded warriors and their families. Her debut novel, Forgive & Forget was voted “Best of 2013” by Suspense Magazine. She lives in Atlantic Beach, Florida with her husband and three rescue cats.

Please give Heather a warm welcome!

Well, What Do You Know?

Thanks for inviting me to The Romance Dish today, PJ. I always enjoy your blog, both as a visitor and a guest.

The best feedback I receive on my Navy romance novels is: “I learned a lot.” I, too, enjoy learning interesting information through settings and scenarios in novels. Two of my favorite authors, Elizabeth Essex and Rachel Grant, not only write with terrific voice, but I learn so much when I read their work.

Elizabeth Essex writes romance set in the 19^th Century Royal Navy. She holds a Masters Degree in Nautical Archeology and it shows in her work. Almost A Scandal hooked me as I read about everything from the heroine (who is impersonating a ship’s lad) scrambling up the rigging, to bowsprits and forecastles and mizzenmasts. I loved learning the derivation of cockpit when the disguised heroine is sent to sleep in “the dark area at the stern-most portion of the lower deck, where the midshipmen messed, hung their hammocks, and fought like bantam cocks.” Essex is masterful at putting the nautical speak in context so the reader is never “at sea,” but still gets the flavor of being on a 19th century ship.

Rachel Grant also has a background in Archeology—the land kind. I had no idea that architectural and engineering firms employ archaeologists, nor did I understand the type of work they do—besides digging up artifacts left by ancient cultures. In Grant’s steamy romantic suspense novel, Concrete Evidence, the heroine, Erica, must research a house that is eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places. The house is made out of an historic concrete called Thermo-Con, which rises like bread dough after the pour. No one knows the history of the concrete, but Erica sleuths out its origins and its connection to a notable historical figure. Interestingly, Thermo-Con is real and the connection to the historical figure was based on Grant’s actual research.

I enjoy sharing my “Love in the Fleet” series with civilian readers so they can vicariously join the Navy and see what it's like to live and work at sea.  Many are shocked that my heroine in Forgive & Forget  has fifty cubic feet of personal living space aboard her aircraft carrier for a six-month duration. And that the space is under the runway of a major airport with jets taking off and landing on her roof at all hours of the day and night. Many are surprised that she isn’t allowed to “fraternize” with the hero because she is enlisted and he is an officer, but it makes for a perfect conflict in the story. Elizabeth Essex and Rachel Grant inspire me to work the military details into the context of my stories instead of inundating the reader with technical instruction.

My military advisor for Forget Me Not was a patient—and handsome—Navy helicopter pilot. It was difficult to pay attention on the days when he wore a flight suit, but I did manage to learn a great deal about drug interdiction. He explained how drug runners drive their go-fasts at night. A go-fast is a speedboat with multiple uber-expensive engines. The drug mules tarp up at sunrise and spend the day under blue tarpaulins that camouflage them with the ocean. Since their fiberglass boats don’t show up on radar, the helo crews have to go on visuals, like spotting wakes—which is why they run at night. This became the perfect scenario for my external conflict with my hero and his crew tangling with the drug mules.

Adding this firefight with the bad guys to an already hot and conflicted love story really ramped up the action. And while enjoying this suspenseful romance novel, I hope readers will learn about the scourge of the cocaine trade, helicopter operations, and hot helo pilots in flight suits along the way.

I’d love to hear what books or authors your readers enjoy because “they learn something while reading a good story.” I have a copy of Forget Me Not for one lucky commenter.

Suffering from Peter Pan Syndrome and survivor guilt, Navy helicopter pilot and renowned playboy, Brian “Skylark” Crawford, swears he’ll never marry, uncertain he deserves happiness—besides there are too many hot chicks to choose from. 

War widow and veterinarian, Daisy Schneider, swears to love only animals after her Marine pilot husband is killed in Afghanistan—but work fails to ease her loneliness or the guilt that she might have saved him. 

Between one stray, matchmaking cat and a fiery battle with drug runners at sea, the fur flies as Sky and Daisy learn valuable lessons about life, love, and second chances.

www.heatherashby.com

Twitter: www.@HAshbyAuthor

Facebook: Heather Ashby Author

Amazon: http://alturl.com/wb6ru