Review: Not the LC I expected to find
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 05 17, 2012
I really love how LC writes her heroes, and I can usually count on a good read from her, too. But to be honest, this new one isn't a favorite of mine. By no means is it a bad read. I think most fans will think it's a pretty solid read, but with LC, I've come to expect something beyond solid or down the middle. But that's what this story was for me: just okay.Something seemed to be missing for me here in this story with this hero. It felt as if his alpha-ness (is that a word?) was toned down. He just wasn't as intense as her other heroes have been. I also didn't feel as if I got to really know him that much, either. As for the heroine, she has a limp and is sweet, and I liked that about her, that she was different, imperfect, but she was almost bland. She really lacked that spark of something.Also, the h/H don't have sex until late in the book. Of course, there is some sexual tension to compensate, but it's nowhere near what you'd find in LC's other books, imo. Just not the same intensity there. If h/H aren't having sex in a story, I need a tight connection there between them, somehow. I wonder if LC scaled back after the negative reaction some readers had to Raul (Staking His Claim). This hero, Luke, is not PC at all, true, but he just wasn't OTT as I wanted or expected him to be. I wanted more heat in the story, and I'm not only talking sex here.I do feel the story dragged some, as if LC were stretching it out beyond the point where it really should have ended. I know I personally have always wished her to write a longer story, but I do need that story to have something to it, like more action, romance, sex, something. Here, beyond the stage coach hold-up (which the reader does not experience), the only thing kind of exciting is when the h finds herself surrounded by rattlesnakes. Then the H comes to the rescue. That's it. They really go nowhere and do nothing more in the story. He didn't even want her to leave the house. I even thought more would happen with the outlaws.Overall, this isn't a bad story. There are elements here that I do like, elements of the LC I've come to love and expect. However, I still feel some real heat and romance were missing, at least for me. I definitely feel the hero was less than I wanted him to be. I really wanted to fall in love with him, but it just wasn't there. This story is like LC-lite or diet, and I really wanted the extra calories.