Review - - Dancing in the Rain

Dancing in the Rain

By Kelly Jamieson

Publisher: Loveswept

Release Date: April 11, 2017

Reviewed by Janga
  

Hockey was Drew Sellers’s life. When a knee injury ended his NHL career and a cheating spouse ended his marriage, Drew, overwhelmed by self-pity, found relief in a bottle. If he couldn’t live the life he wanted, alcohol could serve to numb the pain of what he was missing. It is at this point that Sara Watt shows up to tell Drew that twelve years ago during a one-time hookup, he fathered a daughter, Chloe. Sara is not looking for support, financial or emotional, she simply gives him the information and leaves him to decide if and to what degree he wants to be involved in Chloe’s life.

Peyton Watt leaves her life as a high-powered reputation manager in New York to take care of her sister in Chicago. Peyton and Sara have always been close, and Peyton helped with Chloe while the sisters were in school. But things are different now. Sara has stage four metastatic melanoma and has only a few months to live. For her own sake as well as Sara’s and Chloe’s, Peyton needs this time with her sister. She is not at all certain that Sara made the right choice in bringing Chloe’s father, an unknown quantity, into the picture.

Peyton decides quickly that Drew is more than the arrogant, privileged athlete she expected him to be, but she is aware of his flaws and she does not pull her punches in their dealings. When he admits he is filled with self-pity, Peyton responds, “Yes, I can see you’re riding the pity train. But the train has just arrived at the intersection of We All Have Problems and Suck It Up Buttercup.” As Drew gets to know his daughter, he is drawn into the circle of the sisters as well. He becomes part of the support system for Sara during the last weeks of her life. He and Peyton are both aware that the potential for more than friendship exists between them, but the circumstances are wrong for a romantic relationship. Things become even more complicated after Sara’s death as issues concerning who is going to parent Chloe arise.

I am not a big fan of secret baby books, but this one overcame my biases. Jamieson deals with the issue of how the pregnancy occurred and why Drew doesn’t know he has a child without reducing me to eye-rolling or book-throwing. I am not a fan of stories that feature siblings involved with the same lover either, but Sara and Drew’s one-night stand with no emotional involvement and the gradual development of his and Peyton’s relationship made it easier to accept the sibling angle. I liked all these characters. Drew and Peyton are flawed characters, but they are likable and authentic in part because of those flaws. Sara is strong and courageous and heartbreaking, and sweet Chloe will move most readers to tears.

Dancing in the Rain is heartrending and heartwarming. It is an engaging romance with an HEA, but it is also more than romance. It offers readers a believable world where bad things happen to good people, but where love heals even as grief endures and people learn that it is possible to find happiness despite loss. If you can appreciate a romance that requires a good supply of Kleenex, I highly recommend this one.

     

Guest Review - - Hero of My Heart

Hero of My Heart

By Megan Frampton

Publisher: Random House Digital (Loveswept)

Release Date: April 8, 2013

If the definition of hell is a place where there is no hope, Alasdair Thornham, Marquess of Datchworth, is in hell. Psychically wounded by his war experiences and grieving for his dead (his parents, his brother, his wife and unborn child), Alasdair is consumed with guilt and self-hatred. He is well on his way to the opium-assisted oblivion that he seeks when circumstances awaken a not-quite-extinguished spark of chivalry. A young woman, clearly drugged, is being auctioned to the highest bidder. Alasdair saves her, and the sense of responsibility he feels for her postpones his plans for self-destruction.

The young woman is Mary Smith, a vicar’s daughter. Her father’s death has left her at the mercy of her brother, a man so corrupted by his gambling addiction that he’s willing to sell not only everything their father has left but also his sister for more funds. But although Mary is penniless and helpless to prevent her brother’s abusing and exploiting her, she has something that the wealthy, titled Alasdair lacks—a modicum of hope. Her father revealed a secret on his deathbed that shattered Mary’s sense of self but also held the possibility of help if she can only get to London.

Alasdair is a reluctant knight and his armor is considerably tarnished, and Mary is wary of trusting anyone, particularly a man. But as the two work together to combat threats by Mary’s brother, who has discovered another way to make money off his sister, and Alasdair’s cousin and heir, who has plans to have Alasdair declared mad, the connection between them grows stronger. The powerful physical attraction that has been present almost from the beginning is enhanced by growing emotional ties.

They are determined to save one another. Alasdair decides that he will marry Mary to preserve her reputation and ensure that she will be financially independent before he resumes his original plan to destroy himself. Mary sees Alasdair’s pain and longs to help him. She recognizes her limitations, but she believes that she can “do something for him: make him, if not whole again, at least not as broken.” These two, neither of whom believes they deserve the other, must work their way past misunderstandings and miscommunication before they can accept the healing and transformation that love can effect.

Frampton gives readers unconventional characters caught in events that test them physically, emotionally, and morally. This is not a perfect book. The villains conveniently disappear with little effort required of anyone, and Alasdair’s final recovery from his opium addiction is too easy. But these are flaws that can be forgiven when set against the powerful characterization of a flawed hero and heroine and their journey, literal and metaphoric, to healing and wholeness.

There’s ample sizzle for readers who like their romances hot, but it doesn’t come at the sacrifice of emotional punch. If you enjoy romance novels that are a little different, more than a little dark, and centered on love’s redemptive power, I recommend Hero of My Heart.

Addendum:

I have a weakness for romance novels that make use of poetry. When the poems are by a favorite poet, the story earns bonus points. I love that a book of John Donne’s poems plays a significant part in Hero of My Heart, and I’m still smiling because Mary reads aloud Donne’s aubade “The Sun Rising,” a poem I love for personal and teacherly reasons. I thought the poems were particularly appropriate since this is an April release and April is National Poetry Month. You can read a good romance and join in the national celebration of poetry and its place in American culture at the same time.

~Janga
http://justjanga.blogspot.com