Year One

This may have been the first Nor Robert's book that I really enjoyed! Year One very much reminds me of Stephen King's, The Stand. It's a dystopian novel about the end of civilization from a plague and the battle for good and evil. There is a lot more magic in this book however. Lots of people who survive the doom (the plague) have found themselves blessed with powers. Many are witches, wizards, elves, and fairies. Not all though were blessed. Some are just ordinary people and they don't take kindly to those with powers. They call them the uncanny and blame them for the plague. Lana and Max along with some others, flee New York City to get away from the raiders and those that wish to use their powers for evil. Along the way they pick up many other people and look forward to starting a community of their own. One that will be safe. How safe can anyone be in a world like this though? A good story, but I may wait a while before I dive into the other two books in the series! 

Identity

This is my second (maybe third?) Nora Roberts book and honestly none of them have really sold me on her. I liked the premise of this novel and I think it could have been written much better. Morgan Albright spent her entire life being shuttled all over the country falling her father wherever he was stationed. When her parents divorced and she went off to college, she vowed to put down deep roots and make a home for herself. By her mid-twenties, Morgan has gone to college, gotten into bartending and bought her first house. It's a fixer upper but with the help of her roommate, Nina, it's slowly coming together. Her goals are on track and she couldn't be happier. That is until a smooth talking man waltzes into her life. After a few dates, she invites him over to her house for a homecooked dinner and to meet her roommate. Nothing will ever be the same again. Morgan's roommate is murdered, her identity stolen, her dreams are slashed, her life uprooted, and she'll have to move in to her grandmother's house with her tail between her legs. She starts the slow laborious process of starting her life over, but can she ever really trust anyone again? And will that smooth-talking man come back into her life to finish the job? The end was a bit of a let down. Also this book was so wordy and had so much unnecessary detail. Oh well, I guess. I didn't hate it. 

Dance Upon the Air

WOOF! This book was.... not good. Helen is running away from a violent past. She faked her death so her wealthy, influential, and super abusive husband would let her go. She ran and hid for months, finally settling on Three Sisters Island. There she reinvented herself as Nell and started baking and cooking at the local bookstore. She quickly made friends, caught the eye of the local sheriff, oh and discovered she was a witch (honestly - that witch aspect added nothing to the story for me, and I like witchy stuff - I feel as if it were thrown in as an afterthought). Things are going well, but there is something ominous on the horizon, will her husband discover she is alive? The thing that really ticked me off the most about this dang book was the fact that the "hero" - the local sheriff, was such a total dickhead! A big ol' unsympathetic macho jerk. She ran away from one loser and fell straight into the arms of another one. UGH!!

All I Want for Christmas

I think this is only my second Nora Roberts book, but I sense a theme of beautiful people falling in love with each other. Zeke and Zack Taylor decide that for Christmas they want a mom. They write Santa early in the fall so that he has time to find them a perfect woman for their dad to fall in love wit. When Nell Davis moves to their small community as the new high school music teacher the twin boys are smitten. She's beautiful and nice and they are certain that she's the one Santa sent. Their dad, Mac does notice Nell and the attraction is mutual, but he's so worried about hurting his boys or having a woman walk out on his boys that he's not sure if he even wants to purse things with Nell. Will the boys get their Christmas wish or not. Predictable and cheesy, but okay for a holiday novella.

Come Sundown

This was my first and most likely last Nora Roberts book. I was not impressed and it was so formulaic that you could see the twist and the ending a mile away. Some might try to classify this as romantic suspense, but the suspense is so minimal I don't even want it included. It's nearly 500 pages of romantic fluff, cliches, cowboys, ranch life, independent women, kidnapping, and family secrets. It goes back and forth in time to show the disappearance of a girl in the early nineties, the mind of a deranged kidnapper and rapist, and the modern day life of the manager of a huge family ranch and resort. It's nothing to write home about.