I picked up this anthology because I love J.D. Robb’s Eve Dallas series and was particularly intrigued by the Eve Dallas novella included in this anthology. Have you ever wondered what Eve Dallas would be like if she were possessed by a 90-year-old Romanian woman? She even learns how to make goulash! This definitely does not disappoint. The ones by Ruth Ryan Langan and Mary Kay McComas are cutesy ghost stories, but Patricia Gaffney’s contribution to the anthology—a ghost story, yes, but so beautifully written that it made me miss the splendid Wyckerley novels she wrote back in the days. *Sigh* The one story that intrigued me and made me chuckle at the same time, however, was the novella contributed by Mary Blayney— a Freaky Friday gimmick that involves the switching of the bodies of a husband and wife… in Regency England. I don’t know if there are any books that contain this trope in Romancelandia—and please, give me some titles if you can think of any—and this might be the first time I’ve ever seen in it. Good times. Anyway, let’s break it down.

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The tag-line for this book is “How much trouble can a bunch of babies be?” Oh, Mary Anne, you’re a professional babysitter. You know exactly how much trouble they would be. For those of you who don’t know who Mary Anne Spier is, she is the best friend of the founder of the Babysitters’ Club, Kristy Thomas, and one of its original members. What is the Babysitters’ Club, you ask? The BSC was a business venture hatched by Kristy Thomas when she saw how hard it was for her mother to find babysitter. Kristy figured, why call around looking for a babysitter when you can call one number and reach all seven at once? The original members of the BSC include: Kristy Thomas (the Innovator, softball coach, and lover of turtlenecks, jeans, and baseball caps), Claudia Kishi (junkfood junkie, slob, fashion plate, “not very good at school,” Token Asian), Stacey McGill (sophisticated, diabetic, fashion junkie, best friend to Claudia, New York native), and Mary Anne Spier (dead mom, best friend to Kristy, the first one in the BSC to have a real steady boyfriend, former wallpaper, suffers from self-esteem issues). The four of them are all thirteen years old, in the eighth grade, and attend Stoneybrook Middle School. They are FOREVER going to be thirteen years old and in the eighth grade. They will never grow up, go to college, get out of the babysitting gig and Stoneybrook… *sobs* The BSC later on expands to include Dawn Schaeffer (displaced Californian, dirty hippie, healthfood junkie, possibly token Democrat), who is Mary Anne’s step-sister; there is also Jesse Ramsey (ballet dancer, former babysitting charge, Token Black Girl), and Mallory Pike (redhead, braces, oldest child in a family with eight kids, loves ponies, best friend of Jesse). The members of the BSC meet on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, from 5:30 to 6 PM; the meetings are held in Claudia’s room because she is the only one with her own phone (with its own phone number and line), and every week, Stacey the club’s treasurer collects dues from the other girls, which they compile to buy things that the club needs like junk food, paying for Claudia’s phone bill, and replenishing the Kid Kits (another one of Kristy Thomas’ bright idea). They don’t have to share the money they get from their babysitting jobs, but they do have to pay taxes dues. Got it now?

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“Lake of Dreams”, a novella by Linda Howard in the anthology Everlasting Love, has always been one of my Howard favorites. It’s haunting, romantic, suspenseful, and very erotic. Lake of Dreams is about a young woman on vacation in her family lake house and encounters a man she has never met before, but something about him is naggingly familiar. She dreams about him night after night and the dreams are increasingly erotic, but each one somehow ends with her pleading for her life and him killing her. She is afraid of him, but also obsessively drawn to him and finds herself seeking him out when she should be running in the other direction. It’s not only my favorite “love never dies” story, it’s one of my favorites, period. I just love the idea of a love so strong, so passionate that not even death can tear the couple asunder. Basically, the two lovers come together twelve times and each one has ended in tragedy. On the thirteenth try, they get together and remember everything that had happened in the past because this is their last chance to be together and therefore the last time to get it right. This is the premise of Emma Petersen’s “Make Me Remember,” a novella about a doctor in a small reservation town who falls in love with a Native American sheriff because of the sexy dreams she’s been having about him, apparently stemming from a previous life they may have shared together. Whereas Ms. Howard’s “Lake of Dreams” was emotionally resonant, however, Ms. Petersen’s novella is not as effective because not only is the story too short for the narrative to work, it is also seemingly bogged down by the numerous sex scenes, which oddly enough, prevent the hero and heroine from getting to know each other in a way that rings true to the reader.

Hannah Bryant has always been different. Since she was a child, she’s had vivid dreams of death and loss. Years later, Hannah is a successful doctor who’s gotten past the terrors that used to plague her. In a flash, everything she has worked so hard for is in danger when the dreams return with a vengeance.

But the dreams haunting Hannah’s sleep now are nothing like the ones from her childhood. No longer does she dream of death and destruction—now her dreams are of a man who elicits a reaction from Hannah’s body that’s strangely familiar and startlingly brand new at the same time.

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Bam:

Ghosts, magic and shapeshifters, oh my! If I keep repeating that phrase will I get through the books in time? First: that might have been the biggest box of books EVAR. Are you trying to make me go blind? Second: I am in the middle of busy season, but feel REALLY bad about not reviewing more often. Third: I am employing the lightning review technique used for the last box. Since there were so many books, I’d like to make sure I get through as many of them as possible, so everyone can share the love! Here we go again with Shuzluva’s Superfast Box Review!

Book: Heart Fate
Author: Robin D. Owens
Grade: D+

In Brief. The story of Tinne Holly and Lahsin Burdock is the 7th book in the HeartMates series by Ms. Owens. Clearly, I’m well behind the curve here since I haven’t read any of the previous books in the series. Lahsin is on the run from her husband as her powers are beginning to appear. She seeks shelter in a hidden corner of Druida City that can only be found by those truly in need. Tinne has just been forced to divorce his wife Genista and seeks refuge in the same hidden spot. Tinne knows that Lahsin is his HeartMate but can’t tell her for some reason that I wasn’t quite clear about, and I’m not spoiling anything here, because there is a list of characters and their relationships prior to the first page of the story.

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Bam,

Thanks for the box ‘o books. I am diligently (or making the earnest attempt at) reading everything. Since I received the new box, I decided it was high time for me to get together reviews of the old box. Man, that was a lot of books. I laughed, I cried, some were better than Cats. And some definitely were not. I couldn’t imagine writing full reviews for all of these, and seriously applaud those who do, because it’s just too overwhelming for me. So instead, here’s Shuzluva’s Superfast Box Review!

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