Review: sweet light island romance
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 05 5, 2013
ARC supplied by Netgalley.Sometimes you just want a nice and simple, easy to read romance. This book is just perfect for that.  It centres around two characters, Zoe and Rory who were very much in love but as happens sometimes fell apart without really knowing why. Zoe left her workaholic husband and set up a destination honeymoon retreat. She'd been really unhappy living in busy LA with Rory, rarely seeing him and she felt she was losing herself. She loves living on the island, doing what she's doing but.... the fly in the ointment? A premier honeymoon magazine wants to do a feature on her and Rory believing they're still madly in love. Rory has his own reasons for agreeing, not least that he's convinced it'll just be a few days away and he'll bring Zoe back with him. He doesn't see their marriage as over, he thinks Zoe just needed some time alone....he's in for a shock!I liked both Zoe and Rory, that goes along way in how I feel about a book. I understood why Zoe left and felt for her, she still loved Rory as the man she married but he'd become someone else she didn't like - the hard headed businessman  - but knew she couldn't stay without being really unhappy so took the hard decision to leave. Rory, like so many men, didn't understand why she left. As far as he was concerned he was building everything for them and he didn't see just how much he'd changed and how unhappy he was, probably because he was rarely home. Zoe loved the island, loved to make the honeymoon couples happy and loved the islanders. As far as she was concerned she wasn't ever leaving. So, something had to give between those two if they were going to be reunited and the book does a great job of describing how the events unfold that led to them understanding each other. There's a sub plot in that Zoe is in danger from someone with a grudge, and also Rory's business which he's normally a very hands on boss and with the island having very little in the way of effective outside communication there could be problems there.The island descriptions sounded lovely, really relaxing and I'd love to stay somewhere like that. I did have a bit of a problem with the way the islanders were with Zoe - as it often is in fiction there was what seemed to me to be a thread of ...how can I describe it? Sort of as if they needed Zoe and her resort, as if they couldn't be happy, live without her and the employment it brought. They seemed a little too grateful - and yet these places existed long before westerners cam along to commercialise them. Maybe that's true of places like this, that they do need the outside influence and help but it just jars with me a bit, but really that's just a personal irritation.The romance was sweet, as often is it was one step forward and two back, and the sex scenes were pretty steamy :) though not overly graphic if you're offended by scenes like that. It fitted well within the storyline. Its not got any great drama or exciting plots but just a sweet gentle island romance.Overall it was a book I enjoyed, but only as a one off - too light for a re read so its a three and half star from me. Its well edited and written - no plot holes. I hate to leave a book wondering "what happened to...." Its priced at 2.63 for 493kb on kindle - no page info but I'd guess around 200-220 pages.