SWEET RETURN

Author: Anna Jeffrey ISBN: 0451222717 12/2007 CONTEMPORARY Publisher: NAL/Signet

He’s traveled the world, but renowned photojournalist Dalton Parker had his reasons for staying away from his family’s Lazy P ranch. Now a family calamity has dragged him back to Hatlow, Texas, to help out—and face his past. But he’s appalled to find that the cattle ranch has become home to a bunch of chickens. Obviously there’s one woman to blame: Joanna Walsh—the most challenging woman he’s ever met. Ever since Dalton strutted back into town, he’s done his best to make Joanna Walsh’s life hell. Dead-set on moving her organic egg farm off the Lazy P, he riles her every chance he gets. Too bad his bad behavior doesn’t stop her from falling for him—or stop him from trying to get her into his bed. Yet when she learns the dark secrets of his troubled past, she yearns to show him why returning home can be so deliciously sweet.

RRAH's THOUGHTS AND PONDERINGS:

SWEET RETURN by Anna Jeffrey is a complicated story, filled with disappointments suffered and hopes shattered. It is also the tale of the people who refuse to let either of those things keep them from attempting to find happiness and love, despite what they've already endured.

Dalton Parker is a man who has kept his distance from his family's Texas ranch for as long as possible. When his brother gets injured and his mother, Clova, is ill, he returns home-grudgingly. There, he finds Joanne, a woman who has stepped into Clova's life and filled the void created by her son's neglect. Rather than be grateful for all Joanne has done for his family, Dalton is rude, egotistical and not at all the gentleman his mother thinks he is.

Much of this story is predictable in that there is a heroine in need of rescue, a family down on its luck and a hero who is capable of saving the day. Dalton's white hat is muddied, though, and his proud steed limps-a lot. This may be the most abrasive hero I've ever seen. He's prickly, obnoxious and even when he's being "nice" there are undertones to his behavior that rub me the wrong way. Even his lovemaking seems self-centered.

This is one romance where I wished the hero and heroine would part ways-it just seemed a better move for her future to be free of Dalton. Actually, I hoped he'd be stomped by the donkeys or pecked by Joanne's chickens. It is a testament to the author's writing skill that she has penned a character who stirs such deep, heartfelt emotions in her reader. I doubt, however, that utter dislike was the emotion she was hoping to stir. SWEET RETURN is well written, but there is little about it that I found sweet.

Kay James