Song of the Willow

Title: Song of the Willow (1993)
Author: Charlotte McPherren (BMI)
Period: American-Western (1881 Arizona Territory)
Grade: B-


I've been in the romance doldrums for quite awhile now. I haven't read a great romance in so long that even an average romance looks good to me now. So I'm acknowledging that I'm grading on a curve here.

Song of the Willow is pretty standard Old West fare that involves cattle rustling, a government agent hero from back east, and a tomboy heroine. Rider Sinclair masquerades as disrespectable Army officer/ranch foreman in an effort to uncover a robbery and smuggling ring. He's been ordered to infiltrate the Vaughn family's cattle rustling operation and its connection to the mysterious boss man. Rider's orders involve seducing Vaughn's beautiful, but unconventional daughter. Rider falls in love and marries Willow in short order never telling her about his role with the government or his original seduction scheme.

Willow herself is the book's saving grace. She is a smart and thoughtful young woman who has been raised more as a boy than a girl. She doesn't reject the norms and conventions of womanhood like so many central casting romance heroines; she just simply doesn't understand them. Miriam, a widowed boarding house owner and town busybody, takes Willow under her wing and offers her instruction in dress and deportment. The strength of Song of the Willow is that she chooses to undergo the transformation for herself to increase her standing in the community, not to impress the hero. She is a smart heroine who doesn't take foolish or needless risks until the book unravels a bit at its conclusion.

The book struggles when Willow character metamorphoses from a smart and tough heroine to a typical space cadet who needs to be saved from disasters of her own making. The book also telegraphs that big reveal about the identity of the mysterious boss man. On the bright side, that the boss man shares his names with that spastic nut from American Idol gave me a chuckle. Song of the Willow is one of only two McPherren books in print, so sadly there will never be any resolution to the shotgun romance of Willow's brother and his Mexican lover. Song of the Willow was an enjoyable read with a generally above average heroine. I’m on the look out for her other book, Love and Fortune.

Love Only Once

Title: Love Only Once (1985)
Author: Johanna Lindsey (Avon)
Period: European Historical-Regency (1817 England)
Grade: B-

Vintage Johanna Lindsey is my romance novel kryptonite. She has a routine formula of alpha hero + minimal character development + abduction plot + secret pregnancy = true love. I don’t know why, but it works for me. Maybe I just expect less in terms of plot and storytelling from 1980s romance. Maybe it is because I love old-school bodice ripper covers. Whatever the case, provided the she avoids the rape and forced sex of her earliest book, I can almost always enjoy a Johanna Lindsey. Love Only Once is happily no exception to that formula.

Nicholas Eden, a handsome rogue of a Viscount with some mommy issues, accidentally abduct orphaned beauty Regina Ashton one evening. He drunkenly mistakes her for a former mistress whose coach Regina has borrowed. They are, of course, immediately in lust. The word of her brief abduction quickly makes the round of Ton gossips and Regina’s powerful Mallory family fears she is near ruin. Regina’s uncle would like to arrange a dawn appointment, however Regina believes her near ruin perfectly fit with her current scheme to have her over protective uncles pick her husband. She insists that Nicholas is a perfect candidate and her uncles reluctantly force his hand. The Viscount, like many a romance novel hero, plans never to marry. In Nicholas’s case it is because he believes any society wife will shun him when she discovers his Big Family Secret. Nicholas treats Regina shabbily during their engagement period in the hopes she will cry off, excluding one night of gazebo nookie. He flees the country after their wedding in desperation.

Lindsey adds a half-cocked shipping/pirate plot that isn’t fully fleshed out to establish a back-story (however fleeting) between Nicholas and Regina’s uncle, James. When Nicholas does return to England he is forced to confront his unresolved family issues while attempting to win back the love and good graces of his wife and unknown son. Regina doesn’t give a fig about Nicholas’s Big Family Secret and is happy to reconcile all the parties involved. Nicholas has been an ass to Regina and thus offers her a heartfelt, if confused, apology for his behavior. Too many romance authors believe that a confession of love is enough to excuse poor behavior. The affective use of an apology along with Lindsey’s charming cast of characters makes the predictability of Love Only Once an asset rather than a detriment.