Mackenzie's Pleasure

by Linda Howard

#7 Book with less than 300 pgs

Rated 3.5

Back Cover:

Barrie needed a saviour. The terrorists holding her hostage surely wouldn''t tolerate her silence much longer. Instead they would silence her. Then out of the darkness he arrived. Rugged and dangerous, he led her straight into his sheltering arms.

My Thoughts:

I am willing to suspend reality to a very large degree, however....Barrie Lovejoy is kidnapped, stripped naked, and bound. She is rescued by Zane MacKenzie Navy Seal. Within hours, he rescues her, and they hide out in a falling down shack in libya. After a short time, she decided to lose her virginity to navy seal stranger. It was awesome.....like your first time after a trauma in a dirty hovel would be. (did you catch the sarcasm? I knew you did!)

After this, they escape with the help of his Navy Seal team, at which time Zane is shot. Barrie, wants desperately to see to Zane and his injuries! She is not allowed to and the mystery begins. Why was Barrie kidnapped? Was her father part of some criminal plot? After a few months, Zane is healed from his wounds and Barrie is confirmed pregnant. Her father and his friends try to keep Zane and Barrie apart. He finally comes for her, sweeps her off her feet and they run away to Las Vegas to get married. He gets his brother Chance to help, and they set a trap for the bad guys.

It was pretty good overall, but the beginning was so unrealistic for me. I just couldn't buy it.

MacKenzie's Mountain

by Linda Howard

#3 title by Linda Howard

rated-4 stars

Back Cover:

Mary Elizabeth Potter is a spinster with no illusions about love. But she is a good teacher and wants Wolf Mackenzie's son back in school. And after one heated confrontation, she knows father and son have changed her life forever. Still paying for a crime he didn't commit, Wolf Mackenzie has a chip on his shoulder. But Mary Elizabeth Potter doesn't see him as the dangerous half-breed the town has branded him. She sees him as a good, decent, honest man. A man she could love....

My Thoughts:

I really liked this book. I think this is only my second Linda Howard. Her books get such great reviews from friends and this did not disappoint. Wolf was definately the strong type, and Joe was too. I liked that the "mousy" teacher could have been a typical "damsel in distress" but was written with a spine of steel. I love that she stood up for her beliefs and her man. I knew who the "bad guy" was, but that was ok. The solving of the mystery was less about the "whodunit" and more about the conflict resolution.

I liked the chemistry. Even though Mary was a spinster, and "innocent" she wasn't written as tstl! Other authors could take a lesson here. Just because a woman is a virgin doesn't mean she has to be an idiot. Even virgins know the "mechanics" of it all. :::rolls eyes:::

I did really fall for Joe. I'm excited to read his story...may have to substitute it for something else in my Summer Reading Challenge....:::nods head:::

Bride of the Beast

Twice wed and twice widowed, Lady Caterine Keith has no need for a champion. She can fend off unwanted suitors on her own and guard her Scottish stronghold without the help of any man. But her sister, knowing better, sends a make-believe husband---a knight with a battle-scarred face almost too frightening to behold. Sir Marmaduke Strongbow has a secret ambition. He wants not Caterine's land but her hand in marriage and her heart to own. With tantalizing caresses, he will show her how a real champion lays siege...and how love is impossible to fight.

I liked this book quite a lot. I could relate in ways to each of the "demons" who plagued both the hero and heroine. I appreciate how, they each had to fight those demons to be able to come together. I wish the heroines final demons had been exorcised a little better, or more obviously.

I enjoyed Leo, the antithesis of the dog in Devil in a Kilt. I'll keep trying Ms. Welfonder's work. Book 2 in the MacKensie Series.