Limecello’s review of Flashback by Nancy Warren
Contemporary romance released by Harlequin Temptation on 21 Jul 01

I really like Nancy Warren’s books, and have recently been on an old school reading kick (much to Sybil’s dismay – sorry!) but I’ve simply been drawn to these books. That and I’ve been getting them as part of my used book purchases, so I’m sharing the love. I know a lot of people miss the Harlequin Temptation line – and I never really read any, so this is a fun look back for a number of people, I hope.

Laura Kincaide is an interesting heroine. She’s someone who has made it on her own, and lives a full life. Laura owns her own successful business, and doesn’t have a dull moment in her love life. In fact, she’s simply too picky, and is the one sending the men off packing. A new project she can’t refuse convinces her to go home, where she realizes “the one that got away” is the one. Laura is a great character with a sense of humor and is sensible at the same time. She gets a bit goofy over Jack at times, but that’s almost to be expected. I liked how normal she was, and how so many of her reactions were natural. Ms. Warren manages to create a real person, who is still interesting to read about.

Jack Thomas is a great hero, who knows what he wants and goes after it. Well, ten years after he first meets the girl. He’s a great guy – a single father who is not only doing the best he can, but one who does a good job. He’s stayed in the small town, and realizes what he’s missed out on when Laura comes back. I liked Jack’s personality, and that he was so human. At times he was uncertain, and willing to ask for help, but that only added to his character. Jack is very entertaining – he gets himself into scrapes, and back out again. He’s also an incredibly upstanding guy, and it’s clear that Jack is a very good person.

The story line was cute, but some parts didn’t flow as much as the rest of it. Laura’s character seemed to have undergone a drastic change from the first chapter to the second. Perhaps some of it had to do with setting, but it didn’t jive completely. That along with the issue (or non issue) as to whether or not Laura was in a relationship. Another minor issue was the conflict Lauran and Jack had when they were first dating – the reason why Laura left town and didn’t come back. I felt that it wasn’t really addressed, and although it was an old argument it was important considering it left Laura emotionally unavailable for such a long period of time.

Nevertheless, it’s a well written book, and I enjoyed the plot. Laura and Jack were both likable, as were the secondary characters. Another major plus was that Jack’s daughter was incredibly normal (this is a good thing in my book). There was humor, heat, a deep emotional connection and a purpose to all the events and occurrences. It was nice to read about a small town that came together and characters that all know something about each other. It was fun reading a book by Ms. Warren written more than seven years ago. Fans of Ms. Warren, and Harlequin Temptation (or Blaze) will enjoy this book.

Grade: C+

Between a Rock and a Hard Place…

Thanks to her matchmaking grandma, Laura Kincaide has got the job of a lifetime… and the last man on earth she would have shocen as a partner. How can she work under the same roof with Jack Thomas when she still hasn’t forgiven him for breaking her teenage heart? How much will they get done when his sexy smile still makes her want to jump his gorgeous bones…?

Jack is more than willing to have his bones jumped by the girl who’s grown into such a feisty woman. But there’s the teeny problem of her attitude. How can he get her to come out and play when she won’t even be in the same room with him? How can he convince her that being with him in the present will be far more satisfying than holding the past against him?

Holly‘s review of Flashback by Jill Shalvis
Contemporary Romantic Suspense released by Harlequin Blaze 1 Aug 08

First things first: That cover? Totally hot. Yummy fireman. Mmmm. Ok, moving on. I read this book before I read the first one in the series, Flashpoint. I have to tell you…I was very disappointed in this the first time around. My major issues stemmed from the plot and the way things progressed after the way the first book in the series left off. I decided to read the first before deciding for sure on this one and I’m glad I held off. The actions of the characters and overall story arc worked much better having read the first and understanding where all the motives of the characters. I highly recommend you read these in order.

Aidan and Kenzie spent a summer getting hot and heavy with each other until Aidan broke it off. He was scared of falling in love, but too bad for Kenzie she already had. Now she’s back in town because her brother was murdered in a fire. She and Aidan meet up again and realize they’re both still attracted to each other. They pick up where they left off, but Kenzie is determined to find the person who set up her brother before he died, and to keep her heart protected.

I really liked the banter between Aidan and Kenzie. I actually chuckled out loud a couple times while reading it. I also liked them together. They had great chemistry and the sexual tension fairly leapt off the pages. I really liked that Aidan respected Kenzie and treated her as grown woman. That was refreshing.

I really appreciated Kenzie’s dedication to proving her brother wasn’t the arsonist everyone thought him to be. I was completely on her side in the beginning, wondering right along with her why no one doubted her brother had actually been guilty of arson before his death. As a sister I imagine I’d act the same way she did.

The problem is, I think she took her tough girl, I-can-do-everything-all-by-myself attitude a little bit too far. I get that Aidan had hurt her in the past. I even get that he deserved payback for that. What I don’t get is why she had to purposely put herself in danger to prove it. Or why Aidan let her.

That was my other problem: Aidan let her. She’s being followed by some creepy dude, getting random phone calls on her cell from some anonymous person, and after nothing more than a token protest about her not calling the cops, Aidan decided to let it go. While I appreciated him letting her do her thing in the beginning, it started bother me the longer it went on.

The suspense aspect wasn’t done badly, I suppose, though I did figure it out early in the book (well, part of it, anyway). I guess I was just disappointed in Aidan’s refusal to push the issue and Kenzie’s refusal to back off, even a little bit. I suppose if I’m being fair, it was her brother, her only relative, with whom she was extremely close. So it makes sense she’d want to clear his name. I guess the way she went about it just didn’t sit right with me.

I really loved the two of them together, though. Their chemistry was off the charts and I love how – when they were fighting with each other – they both paid attention to the other and did their best to support, comfort and care for each other. When Aidan was feeling down about work or stressed out, Kenzie offered him unconditional support. When Kenzie was upset over having lost her brother, or trying to puzzle out the mystery surrounding his death, Aidan didn’t hesitate to work with her and support her. I loved that.

Overall I had some issues with the characters by themselves, but they really worked for me as a couple. The plot was interesting and moved along well, but I wasn’t surprised by the twist (not surprising since I rarely am).

Grade: B+

Summary:

Firefighter Aidan Donnelly has always battled the flames with trademark icy calm. That is, until a blazing old flame returns—in the shape of sizzling soap star Mackenzie Stafford! Aidan wants to pour water over the unquenchable heat between them. But that just creates more steam….Kenzie is not the delicate, fragile female she looks like. She has one clear objective, and nothing will stand in the way of her goal—well, nothing but the red-hot touch of a certain dangerously sexy fireman, that is!

Read an excerpt here

Read Holly’s review of Flashpoint here.

One lucky reader has won a copy of Jill Shalvis’ latest Blaze, Flashback. Click on the cut to find out who…

Eli!

Congratulations Eli! Send your mailing address to redwyne at gmail dot com. Please put “Flashback winner” in the subject line.

Read a Flashback excerpt here.

Read more about Jill Shalvis’ books at her website, and her funny musings at her blog.

Firefighter Aidan Donnelly has always battled the flames with trademark icy calm. That is, until a blazing old flame returns—in the shape of sizzling soap star Mackenzie Stafford! Aidan wants to pour water over the unquenchable heat between them. But that just creates more steam….

Kenzie is not the delicate, fragile female she looks like. She has one clear objective, and nothing will stand in the way of her goal—well, nothing but the red-hot touch of a certain dangerously sexy fireman, that is!

Firefighters and reunited lovers…Sounds good to me! Jill Shalvis’ Flashback was released this month. Read on for an excerpt and a chance to win (yes, WIN) a copy. And don’t forget to visit Jill’s blog. It’s very funny.

Firefighter Aidan Donnelly has always battled the flames with trademark icy calm. That is, until a blazing old flame returns—in the shape of sizzling soap star Mackenzie Stafford! Aidan wants to pour water over the unquenchable heat between them. But that just creates more steam….

Kenzie is not the delicate, fragile female she looks like. She has one clear objective, and nothing will stand in the way of her goal—well, nothing but the red-hot touch of a certain dangerously sexy fireman, that is!

**EXCERPT**
Kenzie hit the icy water, and as she took in a huge mouthful of water, she realized she’d forgotten to hold her breath, a thought that was completely eradicated when the Blake’s Girl exploded into the early dawn.

In the brilliant kaleidoscope of sound and sights, she barely registered the splash next to her, or the two strong arms that came around her, supporting her above the water as pieces of flying, burning, spitting debris hit all around them.

Aidan. My God, Aidan . . . That it was him boggled her mind. She needed to remind him she could swim on her own but the shock of the cold water sapped both her voice and the air in her lungs, and also hampered the working mechanics of her brain.

She’d never experienced anything like it. Never in her life had she been so hot and so frozen at the same time. The heat came from the flames, so high above them now that she was in the water, but no less terrifying. And yet from the neck down, an icy cold had taken over her limbs, making movement all but impossible, weighing her down, sitting on her chest, squeezing, sucking the last of the precious air from her overtaxed lungs.

Someone was screaming, and she envied the ability to draw air into her lungs because Kenzie’s own felt constricted as if she had a boa slowly squeezing the life out of her.

The scream came again.

Huh.

It sounded sort of like herself, and then she realized as if from a great distance that it was herself screaming, which meant that somehow she was breathing. Okay, that was good, very good. So was the man holding her in the water, tucking her head against him, shielding her from the pieces falling out of the sky at his own risk.

“Shh,” he was murmuring. “I’ve got you. It’s okay, Kenzie, it’s going to be okay . . .”

He did have her. Which was a good thing. Without him, she’d have gone down like a heavy stone and knew it. She was hurt, but not that hurt to stop the memories bombarding her at the sound of his voice. How could she not have instantly recognized him?

He was the first man who’d ever broken her heart.

Now, contest time! Leave a comment, any comment to win your own copy of Flashback. About cute firemen, Jill Shalvis, Blaze titles, or the high price of gas. Whatever, I’m feelin’ easy. I’ll pick a winner on Tuesday, August 26.

Have you heard about Jill Shalvis‘s upcoming Blaze, Flashback, coming August 2008? Well you should! It’s one of the American Heroes books. It will make you hot hot hot! (get it? Blaze? Hot? fireman? I crack myself up.) After you finish drooling over the hunk and a half on the cover (which you can see LARGER at the end of the post), read the following excerpt…

E-X-C-E-R-P-T

As they accessed their equipment and laid out lines, three police squad cars tore into the lot, followed by the command squad, all of whom leapt to work on evacuating the surrounding docks. Aidan and company needed to contain the flames, but the explosion burned outrageously hot. He could feel that mind-numbing heat from a hundred feet back. With the Chief now on scene barking orders into their radios, Aidan and the others moved with their gear, their objective to keep the flames from spreading to any of the other boats. They were halfway there with their hoses when it came.

A sharp, terrified scream.

The sound raised the hair on the back of Aidan’s neck, and he dropped everything to run towards the burning boat, Ty right behind him.

The scream came again, clearly female, and Aidan sped up. No one knew better than a firefighter what it was like to be surrounded by flames, to have them lick at you, toy with you. It was sheer, horrifying terror.

They had to get to her first.

Behind them came Sam, Eddie, Cristina and Aaron, directing water on the flames while Aidan and Ty went into rescue mode, pounding down the dock toward the boat. Twenty feet, then ten, and that’s when he saw her. A woman standing on the deck of the burning boat, wobbling, the flames at her back.

“Jump!” he yelled, wondering why she didn’t just make the short leap to the dock, where she could have made a run for safety from there. “Jump‹”

Another exposition rocked them all. Aidan skidded to a halt, spinning away, crouching down as debris flew up into the air to match the new and determined flames. The chief was shouting into the radio, demanding a head count. Aidan lifted his head and checked in as he took in the sights. The boat was still there, and with his heart in his throat, he searched for a visual on the woman–

There. In the same spot she’d been before, still on the boat, on the floor of the deck now, holding her head. Goddamnit. He got to his feet, took a running few steps, and jumped onto the boat with her.

She nearly leapt out of her skin when he landed next to her. “It’s okay.” He dropped to his knees at her side to try to get a good look and see how badly she was injured, but the smoke had choked out any light from the docks and she was nothing but a slight shadow. A slight shadow who was hunched over and coughing uncontrollably.

“The boat…” she managed. “It k-keeps b-blowing up…”

“Can you stand?”

“Yes. I…” She let out a sound that tugged at his memory, but he pushed that aside when she nodded. She got up with his help, twisting away from him to stare up at the flames shooting up the mast and sails. “Ohmigod…”

He pulled her closer to his side, where he intended to turn them both toward the dock and get the hell off this inferno, but several things hit him at once.

The name of the boat painted across the outside of the cabin, flickering in and out of view between the flames.

Blake’s Girl.

No. It couldn’t be. But then came something far more immediate — the rumbling and shuddering of the deck beneath their feet. “We have to move.”

“No. No, please,” she gasped. “You have to save the boat.”

“Us first.” He couldn’t have put together a more coherent sentence because of all that was going through his head. Blake’s Girl . . .

Blake’s boat. God, he’d all but forgotten that Blake had owned a boat.

Then there was the woman in his arms, still facing away from him, still invoking that niggling sense of familiarity. There was something about her wild blonde curls, about the sound of her voice, as the warning signals in his brain peaked at once.

So did the fire. In just the past thirty seconds, the flames had doubled in strength and heat. The deck beneath their feet trembled and quivered with latest and simmering violence.

They were going to blow sky high. Whipping toward the dock with the intent to jump with her, he got another nasty surprise ­ the flames had covered their safe exit.

On the other side of those monstrous flames stood Ty, Eddie and Sam, hoses in hand, battling the fire from their angle, which wasn’t going to help Aidan and his victim in time. Cristina was there too, with Aaron, and even in the dark he sensed their urgency, their utter determination to keep him safe.

They’d so recently lost one of their own, there was no way they were going to let it happen again.

“Ohmigod,” the woman at his side gasped, staring at the sight of the flames closing in on them as if mesmerized.

She wasn’t the only one suddenly mesmerized, and for one startlingly heartbeat in time, Aidan went utterly still, as for the first time he caught full glimpse of her.

He knew that profile.

He knew her. “Kenzie?”

At the sound of her name on his lips, uttered in his low, hoarse, surprised voice, her head whipped to his, eyes wide. Her wavy blonde hair framed a pale face streaked with dirt and some blood, but was still beautiful, hauntingly so.

She was Mackenzie Stafford, Blake’s sister. Kenzie to those who knew and loved her, including all the millions of viewers who knew her as Sissy Hope on the soap opera Hope’s Passion.

She was no a stranger to Aidan, but not because of her television stardom. Aidan knew her personally.

Very personally. “Kenzie.”

“I can’t– I can’t hear you.”

People never expected fire to be so noisy, but it was. The flames crackled and roared at near ear-splitting decibels as it devoured its way through everything in its path.

Including them if they didn’t move, a knowledge that was enough to pull his head out of his ass and get with the program. Old lover or not, he still had to get her out of here alive. But she was looking at him through Blake’s eyes, and his heart and gut wrenched hard. There was maybe twenty feet of water between the Blake’s Girl and the next boat, which was starting to smoke as well, and would undoubtedly catch on fire any second. It didn’t matter. They had no choice. “Kenzie, when I say so, I want you to hold your breath.”

“D–do I know you?”

He wore a helmet and all the gear, and in the dark, not to mention the complete and utter chaos around them, there was no way she could see him clearly. Still, he had to admit it stung. “It’s me, Aidan. Hold your breath now, on my count.”

“Aidan, my God.”

“Ready?”

“The boat’s going to go, every inch of it, isn’t it?”

Yep, including the few square inches they were standing on. In fact, it was going to go much more quickly than he’d have liked. Since they couldn’t get to the dock, it was into the ocean for them, where they’d wait for rescue.

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “There’s got to be another way.”

Unfortunately there wasn’t, and he quickly stripped out of his protective jacket and gear because the seventy-five pounds of extra weight wouldn’t be a day

in the park while treading water and holding up a victim
to boot. At least she was conscious. She didn’t appear to have on any shoes, or anything particularly heavy on her person, all of which were points in her favor. “On three, okay? Remember to hold your breath.”

“I don’t think–”

“Perfect. Go with that. One–” He nudged her in front of him, pushing

her to the railing.

“Aidan–”

“Two–”

“Are you crazy?”

“Three.”

“Hell, no. I’m not going into the‹”

He dropped her into the water, and she screamed all the way down.