-
- Once Burned
-
-
- Author: Jackie Griffey
- Reviewer: Rita Porter
- Publisher: Zumaya Publications
- Format: Adult, Fiction, Paperback, 213 Pages, 2005, $22
- ISBN: 1554101301
- Rating: * * Quills
- www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/asin/1554101301/scriquil
-
-
-
- Chris Lovell stares at the most gorgeous man she has ever seen, then runs away. Betrayal by men, which started when her father left her mom and her, has hurt her to the point of being afraid of any depth of feeling for the opposite sex. She works for a small insurance claim company owned by friends working to help settle claims sent out by bigger companies.
-
-
- She finds that playing hide-and-seek with Mr. Handsome causes her anxiety level to grow. Having never thought to run across this man at work, she is shocked beyond belief when she comes face to face with Richard Duffle while working on a fire claim -- the same man whom she has run from and gone out of her way to avoid at all costs. Getting to know one another during the investigation and finding out that Richard seems to be as good as he appears, scares Chris.
-
-
- When things start looking like insurance fraud, Chris jumps to conclusions, running away once again without confronting the issues. Taking her boss up on the offer of fieldwork, she leaves town to help out during the busy season.
-
-
- Jackie Griffey makes strong character points with Richard, though some of the strength should have been shared more with the opposing character Chris. Instead of leading the reader to think that Chris is insecure, her background write-up left the reader thinking she was standoffish so as to make herself appear unappealing to the opposite sex. Richard fit his write-up well. The supportive ones fell into suit in such a way that they blended well with the story.
-
-
- The plot was slow to build to the climatic top, but once well on the road there, the pace picked up with good twists in the plot so that the reader did not get bogged down in descriptive writing. Griffey writes a decent romantic suspense, so as not to offend the pure mind of the reader, nor scare them beyond their own imagination.
-
-
- Overall, this reader enjoyed it as a very light and somewhat humorous story, though lacking in some of the depth I generally look for. I would recommend Once Burned to anyone who is looking for a touch of simple romance with some twists down the road.
-
|