Review by Jamaica Layne

Rating: 4 Stars

I have to say I was somewhat skeptical when I picked up this book. First, I'm usually not a fan of books that are tag-team written by two authors. In my experience, books that have multiple authors are usually a muddle of different voices working against each other. Plus, book is about a three-way marriage----and the book's cover makes no secret about its subject matter, with a tuxedoed groom with a white-gowned bride on each arm. I'm not usually a fan of the love-triangle story, so I went into this book waving a lot of red flags around. But Dow and Poole's tight, focused writing, along with their very original take on the old love-triangle theme, make this book well worth a read.

The plot centers around Dwight Wilson, a successful software executive, his longtime wife Tracey, and his newfound love Alicia, whom he meets when he has to move away from his home in Jacksonville, Florida to Washington DC as part of a job transfer. Tracey is settled into her life in Florida and refuses to move to Washington, forcing Dwight to enter into a long-distance marriage. The marriage begins to fall apart, and Dwight begins romancing Alicia Dixon on the side. Dwight files for divorce, and he marries Alicia when his divorce is final so they can both begin a new life in Washington---or so he thinks. But unbeknownst to him, back in Florida Tracey contests the divorce at the last possible second and it doesn't go through---making Dwight a bigamist. All manner of shenanigans occur, to the point that when Tracey and Dwight find out that their "husband" is simultaneously married to two different women, they decide to try out a "three-way" marriage arrangement so they can both keep their man. But guess what? It doesn't work. The whole arrangement falls apart in the most catastrophic way possible.

Dow and Poole made clever use of their different writing styles and author voices by having the narrative switch back and forth between the two women in the love triangle. This works very well. Each chapter is dedicated either to Tracey---the longtime, settled wife and mother----or Alicia, the "other woman" who becomes a wife and mother herself---offering the reader a chance to get inside both women's heads. Though the plot becomes more and more implausible---almost soap-opera-like at times----Dow and Poole's unique voices and strong characterizations keep the reader hooked at all times. Perhaps the book's greatest strength is its snapshot-like ability to capture the nuances of upper-class African-American society, along with its biting social commentary on some of that segment of society's traditions, taboos, and unspoken rules of love and marriage.

We Take This Man is a complex-yet-satisfying tale that asks a lot of tough moral questions, and resolves those questions in ways that you probably won't expect. Authors Dow and Poole make up a unique and memorable writing team. Definitely pick this one up---you won't regret it!

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Reviewed by Jamaica Layne (http://www.jamaicalayne.com and http://jamaicalayne.blogspot.com)

The Wild One is Denise Eagan's second novel, the followup to her well-received debut, Wicked Woman. This historical romance is set in the American Old West, beginning in post-Civil War San Francisco, and the plot meanders around through Colorado and finally to Texas not far from the Mexican border. Shakespearean actress Jessica Sullivan shares a tiny flat with her fellow actress Michelle, a Midwestern jezebel stage actress who bleaches her hair and pretends to be French. Unlike her sensual roommate, who has a whole host of lovers, Jessica is "frigid" and celibate, not just because she is actually married (her estranged ne'er-do-well husband abandoned her six years ago), but because she truly believes that she does not enjoy sex. Lonely and miserable Jessica takes comfort in her supposed frigidity, but finds herself shaken out of her comfort zone when she is attracted to Lee Montgomery, a free-spirited professional gambler and general scoundrel who also happens to be Michelle's current flavor-of-the-month boyfriend.

Jessica has been saving all the money earns from acting over the past six years to pay back her family for the money her estranged husband helped her steal from them. But instead of using a bank (which were notorious for sudden failures in the 1800s), Jessica asked the manager of her acting troupe to "hold" it for her. When the troupe manager suddenly shuts down the San Franscisco show and insists the troupe move to Denver, she discovers that he hasn't "held" the money for her at all---instead, he's used it to support his gambling habit, and every cent of the money she's saved over the past six years is gone. Desperate and broke, Jessica engages Lee's help to confront her boss----and instead they find him dead, murdered from a slit throat. Jessica and Lee are framed for the murder and have to flee on horseback across the frontier to avoid death by hanging. Passion, drama, and excitement ensue----and I can't say much more about the plot without giving away too many spoilers.

The Wild One is a sexy, engaging read, but it is not without its flaws. For example, there are a lot of jarring anachronisms that deter from the historical setting, especially in the characters' speech. Many conversations sound a lot more twenty-first-century than they do nineteenth century (no Victorian-era person ever said "OK", let alone in every other sentence) and even though Michelle's French accent is supposed to be fake and her French phrases and grammar poor, that doesn't excuse the author (or editor) for misspelling tons of French words. (I minored in French in college, so I am a real stickler for that). Plus, the copyeditor really seemed out to lunch on this book----it's riddled with typos, from missing words and skipped phrases to rampant misspelling (I recall seeing the word "brooch" misspelled three different ways on the SAME PAGE).

If you can get past the typos, anachronisms, and somewhat clunky beginning, though, The Wild One is still an entertaining book. The plot is suspenseful and keeps you turning the pages, and the love scenes are appropriately steamy.I look forward to Denise Eagan's future books as she continues to develop her career.

THREE STARS (out of 5)

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Reviewed by Jamaica Layne (http://www.jamaicalayne.com)

It had been a long time since I curled up with a novel from Harlequin's red-hot Blaze line, so when the good folks at Book Talk asked me to review this book as my first guest review on the blog, I jumped at the chance. It had been quite a while since I'd read any series romance at all; in fact, so I was curious if the line had changed any in the four or five years it's been since I last read it. As an erotic romance author myself, I'd been a fan of Blaze (Harlequin's sexiest line of traditional romances until they began the Spice line a year or two ago) from its earliest days.

If Lisa Renee Jones' Lone Star Surrender is any example, it seems Harlequin has turned up the heat in its Blaze line considerably. The book opens with a sex scene, in fact---and this is no ordinary sex scene, either. The book's heroine, Nicole Ward, a federal prosecutor in South Texas about to try the case of her career, meets a mysterious and sexy Latino man in a crowded bar, who without even giving his name, brings her to orgasm right in the middle of the bar. Nicole----freshly divorced and on the lookout for a one-off fling---doesn't yet know that this mysterious man is going to be a very big part of her life very soon.

Nicole is about to prosecute a sinister drug lord named Alvarez. The feds have been building a case against him for three years, and Nicole is literally risking her life trying the case. After a threat on her life by one of Alvarez' men, she is placed under FBI protection until the trial begins by one of the undercover agents who helped the feds infiltrate Alvarez' drug empire. To Nicole's shock and surprise, the undercover agent assigned to protect her is none other than the mysterious stranger she hooked up with in the bar a night earlier. His name is Constantine Vega, and he's a dark, mysterious man, far more than Nicole ever bargained for.

Lone Star Surrender is a cross between a traditional sexy romance and a suspense thriller. The story is fast-paced and addictive as it follows Nicole and Constantine as they try to evade Alvarez' assassins before Nicole has a chance to try and convict him. There are machine-gun-filled ambushes, sex-filled hideouts in caves, dirty cops and corrupt lawyers----along with plenty of red-hot sex. I had trouble putting this book down. Still, there are a few continuity issues (one scene has Nicole and Constantine seemingly trapped inside a desert shack while surrounded by gunmen; yet on the next page, they somehow have escaped to the woods, but no explanation is given how they managed it).

Despite a few rough patches, Lone Star Surrender is an engaging, entertaining read. I'll look forward to Lisa Renee Jones' next book.

Lone Star Surrender, by Lisa Renee Jones. (Harlequin Blaze #442- January '09). Paperback, $4.99.
Rating: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

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