A Virgin River Christmas-5 stars
A great installment in the series before it started going a bit downhill for me. This book follows Marcie Sullivan as she tries to find the man (Ian Buchanan) who saved her now dead husband who is holed up in Virgin River. I honestly loved the character of Marcie and I enjoyed how she and Ian get together. Seeing how the small town comes together to celebrate Christmas together was really good too. We have appearances by my nemesis Jack and his wife Mel, and of course Paige and Preacher and others.
“A Virgin River Christmas” has widow Marcie Sullivan tracking down Ian Buchanan. When she gets to the wilds of Virgin River and realizes it won’t be smooth going, she refuses to go home, she vows to stay and make sure that Ian comes back to the land of the living. Ian’s life since being injured hasn’t been great. He is angry and no longer in the Marines. He just wants to be left alone. Marcie though has other ideas.
I just had a great time watching Marcie and Ian bounce off of each other before they finally let go and just got together. Carr doesn’t write steamy love scenes (in my opinion) but it was great to read how Marcie and Ian finally get together.
What a Mess–Too Many Characters/Plots
Second Chance Pass-2 stars
Woo boy. This one really didn’t work. The main couple (Vanni and Paul sucked) but Carr decides to force in romances for a friend of Paul and Vanni’s and then we have too focus on Jack and Mel, and then we have Walter and a retired Hollywood actress, and I know I am blanking on someone else. We have appearances by Mike, Preacher, and Paige. I have no idea why Carr didn’t focus on the main couple. And I have to say that some of the asides in this book about how Jack doesn’t feed firefighters who are the “felon” squads ticked me off. Sure, these men are out there trying to keep your home from burning, but don’t deserve free food. Carr ticked me off again when she has Mel pro home birth and doesn’t talk about the dangers at having home births. We do have something happen, but it’s like a blip and forgotten. This book went on way too long. Was so glad to be done with it.
“Second Chance Pass” has Paul Haggerty reeling from the fact he has fallen for his best friend’s now widow, Vanessa Rutledge. He has been there and helped Vanessa as she’s now trying to raise her baby son and is scared if he tells her how she feels, she will reject them. However, something from Paul’s past may cause the couple more problems than anticipated. We also have Mel and Paige both pregnant and readying themselves for their births. The book jumps around to too many characters for you to get a sense for anyone. Vanessa started to annoy me and definitely bugged me after she got on Paul’s friend Joe’s back about him starting up a romance with a friend of hers who acted like a loon.
This was the first book when I started to get a bit turned off by Virgin River and it’s characters. I felt that too many of them were so aggravating I couldn’t imagine being around them for more than 5 minutes. Jack is in everyone’s business and he and Mel are similar to a soap opera super couple.
There was no real tension in this one I thought. Just a lot of people being dumb about getting together with each other.