Review Tuesday: The Lake of Dreams - #romance #family #memory #ReviewTuesday

The Lake of Dreams by Kim Edwards

Penguin Books, 2011

The summer after high school, Lucy Jarrett left The Lake of Dreams, the lovely upstate New York town that had sheltered her family for four generations. Heading west to college, she left behind her grieving mother, her half-Seneca boyfriend Keegan Fall, her hostile uncle and cousins, and her aching suspicion that she was partly responsible for her father’s recent death. Now, after more than a decade traveling and working around the world, she has returned to the rambling, time-worn lakeside house where she grew up.

She finds that much has changed. Her mother has a new male admirer and is considering selling the deteriorating mansion. Keegan is a successful craftsperson with a five year old son. Her brother has reconciled with and is working for her uncle. The military installation on the lake shore has closed, and conflicts about the fate of this fragile, valuable land are tearing the town apart.

Unemployed, restless, confused about her feelings for her family, the town and the half-Japanese lover she left back in Tokyo, Lucy stumbles upon a cache of objects locked in an old window seat that point to a mystery: a great aunt who lived nearly a century ago, who had been completely erased from the family records. Rose Jarrett fled from England to the US in the early years of the twentieth century, pregnant with the child of a wealthy landowner who paid her passage to make her disappear from his life. Grudgingly welcomed by her relatives in The Lake of Dreams, Rose gave birth to a beloved daughter Iris, but was forced to leave her when Rose became involved with the women’s suffrage movement. Iris grew up without knowing her mother at all.

Lucy becomes obsessed with uncovering the truth about Rose’s life and determining the fate of her daughter. Her inquiries parallel her personal soul-searching about her own life and her future. Somehow, uncovering the long-hidden secrets of Rose’s history and bringing the woman’s heroism and self-sacrifice to light become a path for Lucy to save herself.

The Lake of Dreams is a gorgeous book, lyrical and moving. We see the town through Lucy’s observant eyes, filtered through her love of nature and colored by her memories. Rose comes to life through the intimate letters Lucy discovers, letters Rose penned to her daughter but never sent. Her story ramifies and pulls others into its web, including a famous stained glass artist who created a stunning set of church windows celebrating the power of femininity. I found myself waiting breathlessly for the next revelation about Rose’s past and her legacy to the future.

At the same time, when I finally put the book down, I realized the plot was somewhat contrived and unrealistic. It’s too easy, ultimately, for Lucy to bring Rose back from obscurity. The epistolary record is too convenient, too complete. The startling twist near the end of the novel and the rather implausible happy ending were emotionally satisfying but intellectually a bit of a stretch.

Also, I felt that Lucy ended up with the wrong guy. I always laugh at romance reviews that complain about this sort of thing, but in this case, I felt quite strongly that she made the wrong decision, or at least, not the decision I would have made.

Of course, I’m not going to tell who she ultimately chooses, or what path her life takes. You’ll just have to read the book yourself.

Traveling with your family can be murder - #CozyMystery #Iceland #Giveaway @ark_author

Blurb

One wedding party + one estranged mother = another vacation that goes awry for Naomi.

Naomi is off on another international vacation. She thinks traveling with her mother will be the most difficult part of her trip until she meets the rest of the tour group—a wedding party. It only gets worse when she finds the groom dead. Everyone’s a suspect on her Icelandic tour of this stunning country.

Excerpt

NÆSTA MORGUN {NEXT MORNING}

I had only one thought at breakfast. How did a young man die on vacation? There was no accident, no trauma, no nothing. He was fine one moment. Dead the next. It didn’t make sense.

I looked at my phone. I did the quick math. It was the middle of the night for Charlotte. I still considered calling. Awake Charlotte or just woken up Charlotte would give me the same answer—I had lost my mind. Just woken up Charlotte would be more angry about it.

I could hear her saying that it was ludicrous that I had found a dead body on vacation. Again. But this wasn’t a murder.

Milo’s death had to be what it appeared to be. A tragic accident. He drowned. The police were doing their due diligence in the unexpected death. An autopsy would reveal an accident. I could return to enjoying my vacation, with my mother.

Or at least trying to.

“What are you doing?” I asked my mother when I returned to the room after breakfast.

She was writing in a notebook, as if she were journaling. It had to be her latest fad.

“Recording my recollection of the event,” she answered.

“Didn’t the police take your report?” I asked.

“Yes.” She put her pen down and closed the book. “But this is for Dateline.”

“For what?” I asked

“For the investigation show. You have to know it. I watch every weekend.”

“And why would you need notes?” I asked.

“Because I’m sure we’ll be called in.” There was an excitement in her voice that was disturbing. “We were eyewitnesses. You pointed it out to that guide.” She seemed oddly proud of that.

“Sigi,” I told her.

“Yeah, the guide. They’ll probably want to talk to him too. But maybe his company won’t let him talk to the press. It’s not really the publicity the touring company would want, right?”

I ignored her question. “Did you see something useful?” I asked.

“Not that I know of. But these shows would want to talk to anyone who could give them any perspective. I had a bird’s-eye view of all of you. You were only a few feet away. You flirted with the dead man shortly before his death.”

“I did not flirt with the groom, Mother.”

“I’m not judging,” she retorted. “He was a good-looking guy. You’ve done worse. Do what you want on vacation. Anyway, the shows won’t care.”

“Shows?” I asked.

“Definitely. There’s 48 Hours, plus the ID Network has a bunch of shows. We would do them all.”

This was not the mother-daughter bonding I had envisioned. Not that I had ever envisioned mother-daughter bonding for us.

She didn’t note my horror and continued, with even more excitement. “New groom dies on vacation. That’s a big story. Plus, he’s handsome. They always love when the handsome ones die.”

“Mother!” I rebuked. “He drowned. Why would Dateline or any of those shows do a story on a drowning?”

“Because he was murdered! Had to be. Who drowns snorkeling in clear calm water? I Googled it. No one has died there before. You heard the police. They told us to stay in town.”

“Considering our return flight isn’t for several days, I think we’re good.” I went into the bathroom but then stopped. “What do you mean you Googled it?” My mother was not good with technology. That was more her mother’s area of expertise. “Let me see this Google search.”

She handed me her phone. The detective had told me others had died there. I couldn’t imagine he would be wrong. Or worse, that my mother was right.

I hit her internet browser and pulled up her last search. “Death at Thingamajig.”

I handed her back her phone. “We were at Thingvellir yesterday, Mother. Not at ‘Thingamjig’.”

“Close enough,” she said, dismissing me.

I didn’t bother Googling deaths in Iceland for her. We still had a few more days on vacation and I wanted to leave the hotel again.

I glanced at my watch. “We have two hours until our tour.”

“What tour?” she asked.

“Check the itinerary. I’m going to walk around Reykjavík.”

The hotel was at Old Harbour with the city center only a few blocks away. As I exited the hotel, I took in the harbour’s pier with the many fishing and tour boats docked. The pier was lined with large teal buildings, housing restaurants and touring services. Mount Esja was in the distance.

I took a deep breath of the clean air. No smog here. Other than spending time with Pops as a child, I could not remember ever breathing air as fresh.

I read the harbor’s sign about the touring companies stationed there. Whale-watching options were plentiful. I’d have to check back later on pricing when they opened.

My phone rang as I walked up the hill toward the city center. I almost didn’t check it, assuming it was my mother, asking where we were going later. I was surprised when I saw Charlotte’s name and face appear.

“What is it with you and finding dead bodies on vacation?” she asked when I accepted the video call.

“I didn’t find a dead body on this vacation,” I answered.

“That’s not what Mom said.”

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I shouldn’t have been surprised my mother had told Charlotte. I should be surprised that I didn’t get this phone call last night. “Okay, technically, I found it. I noticed it before anyone else and I pointed it out to the guide. But the guide really found it.”

She smiled. “You certainly found your travel partner on this one, didn’t you?"

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Mom! She’s keen on the whole murder thing.”

“The man drowned. It’s a shame. Tragic, really. But not murder.”

She huffed. “Ooh. I get it.”

I didn’t like her tone. I didn’t know what it meant, but I knew it wasn’t good. “What is that supposed to mean?” I asked.

“Mom thinks it’s a murder, so you think it’s an accident. You always have to take the opposite side from her.”

About the Author

A R Kennedy lives in Long Beach, New York, with her two pups. She works hard to put food on the floor for them. As her favorite T-shirt says, ‘I work so my dog can have a better life'. She’s an avid traveler. But don’t worry. While she’s away, her parents dote on their grand-puppies even more than she does. Her writing is a combination of her love of travel, animals, and the journey we all take to find ourselves.

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Review Tuesday: Unsheltered by Barbara Kingsolver - #ReviewTuesday #Politics #Family

Unsheltered by Barbara Kingsolver

Harper Collins, 2018

This is not supposed to happen in America. After working hard for decades, paying your taxes, bringing up your kids to be good citizens, you’re not supposed to find yourself destitute and close to homeless. Yet that’s the situation in which journalist Willa Knox and her professor husband Iano find themselves, when her magazine folds, the university where he’d finally got tenure closes, and they’re forced to move to a century-old house that’s literally crumbling around them. With no income and little savings, they’re only a few weeks away from living on the street.

The house, a legacy from Willa’s aunt, is part of the former Utopian community of Vineland, founded by a wealthy businessman who was either a visionary philanthropist or an egotistical despot, depending on who you believe. Its leaking roof, moldy walls and rotting floors also provide the shelter of last resort for Iano’s bigoted curmudgeon of a father, slowly expiring from multiple chronic diseases, and their radical socialist daughter Tig (Antigone). As if that were not enough, Willa also finds herself forced to take in a newborn baby boy when her son Zeke’s upper class girlfriend kills herself. Living hand to mouth, camping out on the ground floor of the old house as one room after another becomes unsafe, Willa wonders how the family is going to find their next meal, let alone deal with grandfather Nico’s health issues.

Meanwhile, more than a century earlier, another family struggles to make a life in Vineland. Thatcher Greenwood views himself as fortunate. Though he grew up in poverty and hardship, somehow he managed to snag the hand of lovely, elegant Rose. A self-educated scientist, he has been hired to teach in the Vineland school. He hopes he can support not only his beautiful and somewhat demanding wife, but also her mother and her teenage sister Polly, and make enough to repair their deteriorating dwelling. However, his ardent belief in the controversial evolutionary theory of Charles Darwin sets him on a collision course with the conservative powers in Vineland – a course that could easily lead to his dismissal. His growing friendship with his next door neighbor, amateur naturalist Mary Treat, is the only bright spot in his increasingly difficult existence.

As you might imagine from this brief description, Unsheltered is an ambitious novel with a broad scope. It touches upon many important themes: family ties and conflicts, man’s role in nature, social inequity, preserving history, physical and mental illness, and of course love. I say “of course” because ultimately that’s the only path that leads out of the morass: love for your partner, for your children, for your neighbors, for humanity.

Like all the Barbara Kingsolver books I’ve read, this one is rich with emotion, often painful. Life isn’t easy. Tragedies are to be expected. Yet somehow we manage to pull through.

The structure of the book is strongly parallel, to the extent that it felt somewhat contrived. The chapters alternate between the present (well – 2016, during the last presidential election in the U.S.) and the past. The last words in one chapter become the title of the following chapter. Other Kingsolver novels I’ve read felt much more relaxed and free-wheeling. In this book, it’s clear, the author has specific points she wants to make. Willa and Thatcher share many characteristics, as they inhabit the same space a century apart. In some ways the world has not changed; the same voices that excoriated Darwin in the nineteenth century condemn the warnings of the climate scientists in the twentieth.

I personally agree with most of Ms. Kingsolver’s positions, but I think I would have enjoyed Unsheltered more if it had been less blatantly political.

The characters in Unsheltered are wonderful, especially Tig, the dread-locked rebel who finds herself holding the family together, and the quietly self-directed Mary Treat. All of them grow and change, individually and in their relationships with the others. Meanwhile, as always, Ms. Kingsolver writes beautifully, the sort of prose where you find yourself going back to re-read a page just to savor its beauty. The book has a pleasingly unexpected ending, as long-nurtured hopes crumble but new possibilities appear. There’s not exactly a happily ever after, but you have the sense that Willa and her tribe will make it through. And after some of the more harrowing aspects of the book, that feels like a triumph.

Review Tuesday: The Flying Troutmans by Miriam Toews #ReviewTuesday #Literature #Family

The Flying Troutmans by Miriam Toews

Random House Canada, 2008

Sane families are all alike; every crazy family is crazy in its own way.

With apologies to Leo Tolstoy, this could well be the tag line for Miriam Toews’ original and moving novel, The Flying Troutmans.

Hattie Troutman is living in Paris, trying to adjust to being dumped by her boyfriend, when she gets a long-distance call from her eleven year old niece Thebes (short for Theodora) in Manitoba. Hattie’s older sister Min has, once again, descended into severe depression, leaving Thebes and her brother Logan to cope alone. In fact Hattie has fled to France to escape from her apparent inability to help her brilliant and disturbed sibling. However, she can’t leave the two kids without supervision, despite the fact at twenty six she’s aimless, confused and hardly feels like an adult herself.

She arrives to find everything including the house falling apart. Min had been hospitalized and won’t speak to Hattie or the children. Logan’s about to be expelled from school. Thebes hasn’t taken a shower in a week.

Desperate to do something, Hattie piles the kids into their aging Aerostar van along with a slew of music CDs, a box of art supplies and a cooler of soda. They hit the road to look for the kids’ long-lost father Cherkis, who disappeared into the vast U.S. after Min kicked him out. Following rumor and instinct, the Troutmans zigzag through the American heartland – South Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, Arizona, finally making it to the Mexican border – in a quest that doesn’t really bring them any closer to solutions, but does help them understand how much they love and need one another.

The description above doesn’t really do this book justice, though. All the characters are bizarre, quirky, and extreme. Thebes and Logan (who’s a moody, hormonal fifteen year old) have a precocious intelligence and unfettered creativity that make their conversations a gift. Hattie has no control over them – indeed, very little over herself – as she stumbles along, trying without much success to play the role of competent guardian. The shadow of Min hangs over them all: Min who has tried to kill herself so many times that she’s bound to get it right eventually.

I thought about pulling some quotes into this review, but discovered that the stream-of-consciousness flow of the novel doesn’t lend itself to carving out snippets. Suffice to say that this book is a joy, even when the themes are dark and the times apparently desperate. The Flying Troutmans provides grace and humor on every page. The kids are annoying, sometimes even disgusting, yet you cannot help but adore them. And maybe, as I did, you’ll feel a sense of kinship, a familiarity that reminds you’ve experienced some of this sort of insanity in your own family.

I highly recommend The Flying Troutmans. It might well bring tears to your eyes – it did to mine - but it will also leave you smiling.

Serious --- #erotica #literature #amwriting

Image by PourquoiPas from Pixabay

 

My brother and I stroll along Wingaersheek Beach in Gloucester, whipped by the chill April wind. My decision to live overseas and his aversion to travel don't leave us many chances to talk face to face. Every visit becomes a massive attempt at catching up.

“You're such a great writer,” he comments. I glow at the praise, coming from someone so massively creative. He makes his living as a songwriter and musician, leaving me in something like awe.

“So I don't know why you don't write a serious book, instead of this—this erotic stuff.” He doesn't say it, but I hear “porn” in his tone of voice. My spirits crash land, though it's hardly news that he feels this way. I really want him to be proud of me and my accomplishments in the world of publishing. Instead, he fundamentally disapproves of my work. The graphic sexuality embarrasses and disturbs him. (“I don't want to get turned on when I read,” he told me once.) Despite all my explanations about power exchange, trust and consent, he still believes that M/f dominance and submission is sexist and abusive. In addition, I strongly suspect he views any sort of genre fiction as something less than worthy. We are obliquely related to a very famous literary author whose long shadow falls over all our artistic endeavors.

“My books are serious,” I protest. “Sex and desire are serious topics. We can't understand the human condition without exploring our sexuality.” I don't know why I bother arguing, though. I'm not going to change his mind. And after all, he's hardly alone in harboring these opinions. Scads of people would label what I write “trash”. Some of them would go further, calling my novels “obscene filth”, even “the work of Satan”.

I shouldn't listen. But it's tough to avoid being influenced by negative evaluations, especially when they come from people close to you. My sister is more polite and less extreme than my brother. Still, she's only read one or two of my books (which didn't include BDSM), and shows no interest in reading more.

They're both intelligent, thoughtful people. If they view my work as “not serious”, maybe they're right.

I didn't choose my genre, though. It chose me. Despite my illustrious relative (by marriage), I never imagined myself making a career out of being an author. (Lucky thing...) Still, I've been writing all my life. Nobody showed me how, or particularly encouraged me, yet I created poems and stories from the time I was six or seven. Writing seemed a natural extension of reading, which was an activity in which I indulged at every opportunity. Stories to read, stories to write: one catalyzed the other.

Meanwhile, as I matured, love and desire became my mirror for understanding life. My early sexual and romantic experiences, especially my first (and thus far only) BDSM relationship, profoundly affected my view of the world, my philosophy of life, my spirituality and my sense of self. I was writing about desire, love and sex long before I ever considered publishing my tales.

My husband is less judgmental than my siblings. He enjoys erotica, though he has no tolerance for kink or for homoerotic content. Still, every now and then, he suggests I should switch to a more mainstream genre. “Why not write a mystery?”, he asks. “Or a science fiction novel?” I love both these genres, when done well, but I know already that if I turned my hand to either, I wouldn't be able to avoid adding at least some sexual content.

What about so called “literary fiction”? That's what my brother means by “serious”, I'm quite sure. I'd love to have the talent and vision of Barbara Kingsolver, or Sarah Waters, or Haruki Murakami, but I have no illusions. I don't think I have the necessary depth. Mostly I just like to tell stories. Most of my stories have at least a passing concern with sex and desire.

So I guess that means I'm not “serious”, but I'm not sure I want to be either. A while ago, I read Our Tragic Universe by Scarlett Thomas, which I'd say is definitely intended as a literary novel. The main character Meg has a contract for a literary novel. Over the past three years, she has written, and then deleted, about 500,000 words. Every time she has a new idea, she builds it into the book. When she picks up the manuscript again, though, she finds she has lost all confidence in her original inspiration.

Meanwhile, she supports herself writing science fiction books so successful that they've been optioned for a TV show, as well as a wildly popular young adult adventure series that has turned into a franchise. Every year she runs training workshops for other authors who want to ghost-write “Zeb Ross” books.

Because she can't seem to finish her “serious” novel, however, Meg considers herself a failure as an author.

I write books that make my sister blush and my brother squirm, books that Amazon bans, books that mean I have to hide my true identity and can't share my publishing accomplishments with many people. I'd love to get some recognition, but I'm not willing to twist my creativity into unnatural directions. I'm willing to sacrifice possible fame and fortune—or at least the respect of my family—for artistic integrity. If that's not serious, I don't know what is.

Following a dream - #RomBkLove #TW4RW #Romance @_Iris_B

“It’s not the money that makes you rich. It’s the knowledge that the other person loves you and is always there for you, no matter what. 

That makes you content and, therefore, rich.”

By Iris Blobel (Guest Blogger)

Thank you, Lisabet, for having me on your blog today to share my latest release with your readers.

DREAMS … who doesn’t have them? They’re an interesting part of our life. There are dreams that are straight forward, or awkward, scary, some we do remember, most of them are gone from our memory once we wake and as much as we try to, we are unable to recall details. I love dreams and I try to check the possible meaning whenever I can. Some make sense, most of them I wonder.

The definition of dream according to the Oxford Dictionaries is “A series of thoughts, images, and sensations occurring in a person's mind during sleep.”

Of course, we day dream as well. As an author I most certainly do. As a reader I do as well, long after the story’s finished I imagine how the characters keep going.

In my latest book, however, a dream takes Hollie all the way from Australia to Ireland … because that’s where she believes she can find the person who’s crept into her dreams for the last few months, making her life miserable.

When I started the story about ten years ago I wanted to include dreams, having just figured out a recurrent dream of mine. And where else to have the answer of a dream to be found in Ireland, the land of fairies, leprechauns, and shamrocks. The perfect setting.

I hope you will give the book a chance. One reader wrote: “Beautifully told through vivid imagery, the characters come to life and stick with you long after reading it. Highly recommend!”

Blurb

There must be a reason for her dreams...

Hollie Anderson, a young woman living in Tasmania, is content with life, even more so since she has met Jeremy. However, she has been having a recurrent dream that impacts her daily life, as well as her relationship, a dream that eventually takes her on a journey to Ireland.

Samantha Shaughnessy enjoys the success as Head of Advertising for a popular magazine in the Irish capital Dublin. Married to Padraic, she thinks she loves her husband, but when she meets Hollie under unusual circumstances, she needs to face the truth--and not just about her marriage.

When both women meet and find they share an unexpected tie to the past, will they finally be able to move on into relationships with the men they love? 

 

Excerpt

Hollie stared at the sliding door but didn’t dare to move any closer. So, this was Dublin. She had been glued to the window since the plane started descending. It didn’t appear all that different from Tasmania. There were fields upon fields of green paddocks, divided by hedges and rocks, sometimes in even squares and sometimes, it seemed, just randomly. She even spotted a few double-decker buses from way above.

Overwhelmed by the thought that she was about to set foot on Irish soil, she hesitated.

“Hollie. What are you waiting for?” Davo was already outside, but his movement set off the sensor and the door opened in front of her.

She shrugged. “I don’t know.”

He came back in, took her hand, and led her outside. “I’ll be there all the way. We’ll find whatever is worrying you. I promise.”

Purchase Link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07RGCX3D6

About the Author

Iris Blobel was born and raised in Germany and only immigrated to Australia in the late 1990s. Having had the travel bug most of her life, Iris spent quite some time living in Scotland, London, as well as Canada where she met her husband. Her love for putting her stories onto paper only emerged a few years back, but now her laptop is a constant companion.

Iris resides west of Melbourne with her husband and her beautiful two daughters as well as their dog. Next to her job at a private school, she also presents a German Program at the local Community Radio.

Author Links

Website https://www.irisblobel.com

Blog https://www.irisblobel.com/blog

Twitter https://twitter.com/_iris_b

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/irisblobel

Goodreads https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4067254.Iris_Blobel

Amazon Author Page https://www.amazon.com/Iris-Blobel/e/B00FNFP3LI/

Newsletter http://eepurl.com/b-U0G5

Instafreebie https://www.prolificworks.com/author/irisblobel

Three Reasons to Write a Book About the U.S. Navy - #Navy #Romance #Duty

By Dee S. Knight (Guest Blogger)

I was raised as a Navy brat. That's the long and short of it right there. My dad loved the Navy!! When he left home as a teenager, the Navy became his home and he wasn't shy about letting people know how proud he was to serve. He didn't have an easy job—he was a boiler tender, one of the men who worked in the bowels of the ship and worked with the giant boilers used to power the ship. Lots of noise, heat, and (we found out later) asbestos everywhere, used as fire retardant. He was gone at least eight months out of every year, except for his two tours of shore duty, a total of 6 years out of the 24 he served. It wasn't an easy life, but still he loved it. The reasons why are part of why I wrote Naval Maneuvers. I really wanted to highlight these three factors about military life, and especially about the Navy.

1. Military service isn't only hard on the men and women who leave their families, it's hard on the families. When a spouse is gone for months at a time, the person at home is responsible for the children, the home, the vehicles, their own jobs (because pay in the military is often not enough to support children, homes, and vehicles by itself), and everything that stuff involves. On the one hand, it's an honor to represent the service member, but on the other hand, it's like having a fist fight with one arm tied behind your back. Then, after handling everything for months by yourself, your service member comes home and expects to take back have the responsibility. That is very hard! It's difficult to hold a relationship together and those who do deserve a lot of credit and respect.

I highlighted the family situation especially in “Weighing Anchor”, when Mel Crandall refused to fall in love with a serviceman because of her childhood memories. Her father seemed to miss all of the important events in her life because he was away. Yup, that really happens. My dad missed holidays, birthdays, and my mom's serious illness.

2. The military isn't just a job, it's a lifestyle. On our block in Virginia Beach, only one neighbor was not in the Navy. So a certain camaraderie developed. We all knew when ships had to be met or farewells had to be made. A wife at home had support from others who went through the same trials. It wasn't the same as having the spouse at home, but every wife (or now, husband) knew there was a lifeline of sorts in others experiencing the same thing.

I highlighted this in “Weighing Anchor”, also. Mel's mom reminds her of the "family" they had in the service families they had around them.

3. Someone has to do the dirty job of keeping the nation safe. This has been a truth since countries first had boundaries and armies and navies to defend them. I wanted to highlight that service members are not social misfits who can't do anything else so they entered the service. Unfortunately, that is a view held by a lot of people—that if you can't get into college or learn anything else, you can always go into the service. In each Naval Maneuvers story—“Weighing Anchor”, “Dropping Anchor”, and “Anchor Home”—I wanted to show that whatever you do in whichever service you join, the job is an important one. A necessary one for the existence of a sovereign nation. If not our service members—and in Naval Maneuvers, obviously, our Navy—where would we be?

Now, I know that every serviceman or woman isn’t a saint. The military is, after all, a microcosm of the general population. But I also know the sacrifices members make to go to foreign lands to guard and protect our interests, and I know through experience the difficulties their families go through while they’re away. While I tried to make the book fun to read, and yes, sexy (because after all, that's fun!), I also wanted to show the three points made above.

I am unashamedly patriotic and pro-military, despite its problems and shortcomings. I was raised in the service and married a man who also was raised in the service. And, yes, I'm proud of that fact.

Blurb

Men and women of the armed forces experience desire and love pretty much like everyone else. Except, well, there is that uniform. And the hard-to-resist attraction of "duty, honor, service" as a man might apply them to a woman's pleasure. All things considered, romance among the military is a pretty sexy, compelling force for which you'd better be armed, whether weighing anchor and moving forward into desire, dropping anchor and staying put for passion, or setting a course for renewed love with anchor home.

Buy Link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B079V62PT3/

Available in ebook and print!

Excerpt

"And what is your name, pretty?" Mel Crandall addressed the dinosaur bones in an undertone, bending nearly to face level. The skeleton displayed an open mouth and rows of fierce, sharp teeth.

"Roger," a man standing next to her said in a low voice. Startled, she looked up. Up being the operative word. She stood a decent five feet ten inches, and he beat her by a good half foot. She studied him. He ignored her.

The guy had a solid profile, strong chin, chiseled cheekbones, and a straight back with muscular shoulders. Short brown hair. He wore glasses and stared straight ahead, but glasses couldn't disguise the laugh lines that radiated from the corners of his eyes. His posture was near perfect and he was not overweight, as evidenced by the trim fit of his jeans and red polo shirt that clung enough to give evidence of a low body/mass index number.

As a doctor, she immediately noticed body characteristics before actual looks. But with this guy, examination in lieu of admiration was hard. Men were often put off by the fact that she paid attention to whether they looked sallow or flushed, or if their hands were cold or warm before she "saw" them. She noticed if a man's eyes were dilated or glittered with fever before she registered eye color. Dates started with mini examinations before she relaxed enough to enjoy personalities, but that's just the way she was. Men had to take it or leave it. Sadly, most left it. Which was why she talked to dinosaurs at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History all on her own.

Mel moved on to the next exhibit, a shorter built specimen but still tall and with a nasty spiked tail. "I wonder what you looked like," she murmured. "What color were you, what did you eat, and what's your name?" She bent to read the exhibit information.

"Gray. Grass." That same guy had followed her. Rather than having a strong profile, she was beginning to think he was a weirdo. "Annnd, roger."

Quickly, Mel moved to the next exhibit. "And you are–"

"Roger."

He stood beside her again! Mel started to look for a museum guard but saw none. Great. Planting her hands on her hips, she turned to him. "Stop following me," she said loudly enough that people in the general area turned to see what was happening.

The guy said, "Hold it."

Hold it? Hold it, as in "Wait a minute, little lady?" She opened her mouth to lay into him when he turned and removed his glasses, showing her the richest, most chocolatey brown eyes she'd ever seen. The words stuck in her mouth.

"I'm sorry, what?"

In a lower voice she said, "You're following me from exhibit to exhibit and talking to me. I want you to stop."

"I didn't realize…" He wiggled the glasses at her. "I'm working here and I'm afraid I didn't notice you."

Well. What was worse, that he was a pervert following her place to place, or that he wasn't a perv and hadn't even noticed her?

His brow furrowed while he studied her. "Yes. Yes." Then he shook his head. "Roger."

Again with that Roger.

"Gotta go. Later." Then he smiled at her. "Just a minute, okay?" He folded the glasses and put them first in a protective case. Squatting, he placed a briefcase on the floor and opened it. He stored the glass case inside a pocket. Then he removed something from his right ear—an earbud?—protected it and also put it in the case.

Mel watched all of this with curiosity. He expected her to wait for him? What arrogance. And yet, wait she did. When he stood, holding the case in his left hand and smiled once more, her heart stuttered. The guy was drop dead gorgeous—at least to her understanding of the word. Normally, she appreciated the male form, mostly from a medical viewpoint. This man she enjoyed with pure pleasure.

And Good God. He hadn't been talking to her, he'd been talking to whoever was on the other end of that earbud. Embarrassment flooded her.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I thought you were…" She slid her hand between the two of them and then to the exhibits.

"No," he said. "I apologize. I shouldn't be testing this stuff around people. The last time I did it a kid thought I was calling him Roger." His voice had a soft drawl to it. Western Virginia or North Carolina, maybe? Somewhere in the mountains. It felt like a cool stream as it ran over a body hot and tired from hiking: refreshing and invigorating, at the same time soothing and relaxing. She wanted him to talk more.

Stop that! She laughed. "I thought you were naming each dinosaur." He smiled and dimples indented his cheeks. His eyes crinkled and Mel's breath caught. This guy should come with a warning label. Approach with caution. Could bring on lustful intentions and ultimately, broken hearts. Take only in small doses and in public places.

He held out his hand. "David Stimson."

She took it gingerly, half expecting lightning to bolt between them. Nope. Nothing. So much for romance novels. He had a nice hand, large and warm with healthy pink nails, and she grasped it firmly. "Melissa Crandall."

"Nice to meet you. Do you mind if I wander along with you?" Grasping the briefcase with his left hand, he deftly, he moved to the left of her.

"No, please. It's a free country." She walked to the next dinosaur re-creation. "And this one is…" She half waited for his pronouncement.

"Not Roger," he said, stopping her heart with that killer smile again. He leaned over to read the information. "Torosaurus latus. It says here that these bones were dug up in North Dakota, but that the Torosaurus roamed from Canada to Texas, and that he had the biggest head of any land mammal."

"Well, I guess that's something to be proud of," Mel responded. David laughed and she found herself smiling back. When she moved to the next exhibit, he strolled along with her, hands behind his back.

He pointed to the next specimen. "Poor guy. Starved to death."

"Oh, yeah? How do you know?"

"Can't you tell? He's all bones."

About Dee

A few years ago, Dee S. Knight began writing, making getting up in the morning fun. During the day, her characters killed people, fell in love, became drunk with power, or sober with responsibility. And they had sex, lots of sex. Writing was so much fun Dee decided to keep at it. That's how she spends her days. Her nights? Well, she's lucky that her dream man, childhood sweetheart, and long-time hubby are all the same guy, and nights are their secret.

Find her at:

https://nomadauthors.com

Twitter.com/DeeSKnight

https://www.linkedin.com/in/DeeSKnight/

https://www.amazon.com/Dee-S.-Knight/e/B079BGZNDN