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Yesterday's Hero
Yesterday's Hero (Silhouette Romance, No 426) [Mar 01, 1986] Debbie Macomber …
186 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published March 1, 1986
2 people are currently reading
252 people want to read
About the author
Debbie Macomber
904 books20.9k followersDebbie Macomber is a #1 New York Times bestselling author and one of today’s most popular writers with more than 200 million copies of her books in print worldwide. In her novels, Macomber brings to life compelling relationships that embrace family and enduring friendships, uplifting her readers with stories of connection and hope. Macomber’s novels have spent over 1,000 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. Fifteen of these novels hit the number one spot.
In 2023, Macomber’s all-new hardcover publication includes Must Love Flowers (July). In addition to fiction, Macomber has also published three bestselling cookbooks, three adult coloring books, numerous inspirational and nonfiction works, and two acclaimed children’s books.
Celebrated as “the official storyteller of Christmas”, Macomber’s annual Christmas books are beloved and six have been crafted into original Hallmark Channel movies. Macomber is also the author of the bestselling Cedar Cove Series which the Hallmark Channel chose as the basis for its first dramatic scripted television series. Debuting in 2013, Debbie Macomber’s Cedar Cove was a ratings favorite for three seasons.
She serves on the Guideposts National Advisory Cabinet, is a YFC National Ambassador, and is World Vision’s international spokesperson for their Knit for Kids charity initiative. A devoted grandmother, Debbie and Wayne live in Port Orchard, Washington, the town which inspired the Cedar Cove series.
In 2023, Macomber’s all-new hardcover publication includes Must Love Flowers (July). In addition to fiction, Macomber has also published three bestselling cookbooks, three adult coloring books, numerous inspirational and nonfiction works, and two acclaimed children’s books.
Celebrated as “the official storyteller of Christmas”, Macomber’s annual Christmas books are beloved and six have been crafted into original Hallmark Channel movies. Macomber is also the author of the bestselling Cedar Cove Series which the Hallmark Channel chose as the basis for its first dramatic scripted television series. Debuting in 2013, Debbie Macomber’s Cedar Cove was a ratings favorite for three seasons.
She serves on the Guideposts National Advisory Cabinet, is a YFC National Ambassador, and is World Vision’s international spokesperson for their Knit for Kids charity initiative. A devoted grandmother, Debbie and Wayne live in Port Orchard, Washington, the town which inspired the Cedar Cove series.
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
July 27, 2020
This was a cute but predictable book. I loved the characters and the story. A fast easy read!
October 1, 2021
This book was fine! This is about a girl who is a whale scientist and a guy who is a photographer. They are given the opportunity to go to a small country and study/photograph whales but its a very conservative country and they won't let them stay together if they're not married so they get married to be able to go. She was already engaged to a mama's boy named Siggy who is very stiff and nerdy, but not in a charming way. She thought things were off with him anyway but they make this plan to have a marriage of convenience with Cain then get divorced right after the trip and go ahead with the wedding. As you'd expect, Cain and our female main character (who I already forgot the name of) have a lot of tense moments together that lead to a hook up and feelings. Truthfully, the part I cared most about in this book was the whales! There was a mama and baby whale that were sick and that was HEARTBREAKING, but the rest of it- meh. It was good, but it ended in the way that every other romance book ends and aside from the one scene with the whales there is really nothing that will draw me back to this.
August 14, 2020
A surprisingly good read. I believe the author could have turned this into a novel. Expanding the entire story, especially their research on the island, would have made it a great book. And adding the birth of their child for the ending might have been more satisfying. Still, I loved it.
July 13, 2020
obviously one of her older books great hero
Read
August 4, 2020It was ok.
May 8, 2021
Not her best work but it was ok. 3.5 stars
August 26, 2021
Once again, the heroine is beautiful, the hero is macho, blah blah blah.
July 2, 2022
A fluffy good romance
June 15, 2023
I loved everything about this book. The love story, the whale’s, and the adventure.
April 6, 2024
Interesting, though typical, plot with two career professionals. I was quite drawn to learning about whales.
January 6, 2025
I have really enjoyed this book. Yes it can be predictable but I still wanted to read it all. I love her books.
February 13, 2025
This was a cute book!
October 25, 2025
Another quick short love story. I enjoyed it.
March 1, 2026
I really enjoyed this book, had me laughing at times.
June 7, 2025
delightfully toxic
April 12, 2015
Yesterday’s Hero (2 of 2 novellas in "A Real Prince" - Debbie Macomber)
Plot: Leah is a whale biologist. Cain is a nature photographer. Their university applied for a grant where they would work on an assignment together as a team. But it turns out, the location of their assignment is in some crazy Indian Ocean, micro-nation that only allows a man and woman to travel together if married. So even though Leah’s engaged to some joker (and I mean that with some seriousness: like a 19th Century poof randomly inserted into a contemporary setting - complete with him calling people “fellows”… I say! I say! I say!), she agrees to marry Cain, for the convenience of their travels. He gives her his mothers ring, they marry at the courthouse, travel to wherever, become fiercely protective of each other through their mishaps and trials with the whales, fall in love…
Leah has told both Siggy (the joker) and Cain that she’d divorce Cain a week after returning, stay ‘true’ to Siggy whilst away, and marry Siggy upon returning. Siggy gives her a necklace, and despite their growing mutual attraction, Cain has committed to not pursuing her unless/until she takes the necklace off. Which she eventually does and their relationship formally and intimately proceeds. And then in one of those TSTL moments, as they are about to travel back home, he hands her the necklace which he intends to mean “me or him?” and she interprets as: “return to Siggy - I don’t love you anymore!” [face palm]
So each returns to San Diego angry and heart-broken. Leah finds out she’s pregnant and is super excited. She tells Siggy and formally breaks off the engagement with him. But because both Leah and Cain are either so poorly written or too angsty/TSTL, they only communicate well enough to decide to go to Reno the next day to proceed with the divorce, despite the pregnancy. Cain angrily picks her up the next day, they drive to a private airport and to her surprise, load into a two-person Cessna which he pilots… to some cabin in the mountains rather than the agreed upon magical divorce-land of Reno. (<< Is there any truth in this? Can you actually get same-day divorces in Reno? … I tried Googling it, but the in-flight internet has stopped working…)
She asks: why did we come here? He replies - in all seriousness - I’ve kidnapped you and plan to keep you here until the baby is born. And rather than breaking into a cold-sweat and fearing for her life, she was like: OMG I LOVE YOU.
Awful.
This was the second Debbie Macomber novella I’d read. And obviously two novellas do not an author make, yet these are SO bad. I can’t help but think that an author concerned about their ‘brand’ would not compromise such sub-quality works; but maybe all her stuff is this bad? Which would speak poorly of the masses that popularize her works; she is after all, a very well sold author… << Reevaluating this, I’m like: duh; America specializes in low-quality, mass-consumed goods: McDonald’s, Keeping Up With the Kardashians, etc...
Plot: Leah is a whale biologist. Cain is a nature photographer. Their university applied for a grant where they would work on an assignment together as a team. But it turns out, the location of their assignment is in some crazy Indian Ocean, micro-nation that only allows a man and woman to travel together if married. So even though Leah’s engaged to some joker (and I mean that with some seriousness: like a 19th Century poof randomly inserted into a contemporary setting - complete with him calling people “fellows”… I say! I say! I say!), she agrees to marry Cain, for the convenience of their travels. He gives her his mothers ring, they marry at the courthouse, travel to wherever, become fiercely protective of each other through their mishaps and trials with the whales, fall in love…
Leah has told both Siggy (the joker) and Cain that she’d divorce Cain a week after returning, stay ‘true’ to Siggy whilst away, and marry Siggy upon returning. Siggy gives her a necklace, and despite their growing mutual attraction, Cain has committed to not pursuing her unless/until she takes the necklace off. Which she eventually does and their relationship formally and intimately proceeds. And then in one of those TSTL moments, as they are about to travel back home, he hands her the necklace which he intends to mean “me or him?” and she interprets as: “return to Siggy - I don’t love you anymore!” [face palm]
So each returns to San Diego angry and heart-broken. Leah finds out she’s pregnant and is super excited. She tells Siggy and formally breaks off the engagement with him. But because both Leah and Cain are either so poorly written or too angsty/TSTL, they only communicate well enough to decide to go to Reno the next day to proceed with the divorce, despite the pregnancy. Cain angrily picks her up the next day, they drive to a private airport and to her surprise, load into a two-person Cessna which he pilots… to some cabin in the mountains rather than the agreed upon magical divorce-land of Reno. (<< Is there any truth in this? Can you actually get same-day divorces in Reno? … I tried Googling it, but the in-flight internet has stopped working…)
She asks: why did we come here? He replies - in all seriousness - I’ve kidnapped you and plan to keep you here until the baby is born. And rather than breaking into a cold-sweat and fearing for her life, she was like: OMG I LOVE YOU.
Awful.
This was the second Debbie Macomber novella I’d read. And obviously two novellas do not an author make, yet these are SO bad. I can’t help but think that an author concerned about their ‘brand’ would not compromise such sub-quality works; but maybe all her stuff is this bad? Which would speak poorly of the masses that popularize her works; she is after all, a very well sold author… << Reevaluating this, I’m like: duh; America specializes in low-quality, mass-consumed goods: McDonald’s, Keeping Up With the Kardashians, etc...
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 6, 2016
This is a short novel, maybe a novella actually, published in 1986. I snagged a copy from the local library freebie pile.
This is only the second Macomber book I've read, the first was a more recent release that I can't recall the title of offhand. Anyway, I have to say, even though it's old and has a stupid cover that doesn't match the characters or story, I really enjoyed it. I read it in about two hours one night. Because it's short, you don't form super strong attachments to the H and h, but heck, it was a nice little read. I think this was a better story than the newer one I read of hers. The newer one had characters that felt so generic to me.
The basic plot: our heroine is a scientist who gets the opportunity to study rare whales on a little island that's too conservative to permit her from coming with the only other person on the project, our hero the photographer. She promises to be faithful to her stuffy fiance and wears a "purity" necklace as a reminder that, though she's going to marry and then divorce the photographer, her heart and bod are for him. Yeah, that doesn't happen. The husband on the island expedition is too interesting to ignore.
There's the common stupid misunderstanding that could be solved by a five minute talk in it, and some other stupid tropes, but I liked it well enough. If you're used to lover-looking some of those writing devices then you might enjoy the story.
I really liked DM's skill at building romantic-sexual tension without going to full-on descriptions of every little thing, if you know what I mean. It's steamy but there's still room for the imagination.
This is only the second Macomber book I've read, the first was a more recent release that I can't recall the title of offhand. Anyway, I have to say, even though it's old and has a stupid cover that doesn't match the characters or story, I really enjoyed it. I read it in about two hours one night. Because it's short, you don't form super strong attachments to the H and h, but heck, it was a nice little read. I think this was a better story than the newer one I read of hers. The newer one had characters that felt so generic to me.
The basic plot: our heroine is a scientist who gets the opportunity to study rare whales on a little island that's too conservative to permit her from coming with the only other person on the project, our hero the photographer. She promises to be faithful to her stuffy fiance and wears a "purity" necklace as a reminder that, though she's going to marry and then divorce the photographer, her heart and bod are for him. Yeah, that doesn't happen. The husband on the island expedition is too interesting to ignore.
There's the common stupid misunderstanding that could be solved by a five minute talk in it, and some other stupid tropes, but I liked it well enough. If you're used to lover-looking some of those writing devices then you might enjoy the story.
I really liked DM's skill at building romantic-sexual tension without going to full-on descriptions of every little thing, if you know what I mean. It's steamy but there's still room for the imagination.
June 13, 2016
4,5 csillag
Az írónőtől olvastam már angyalkás és karácsonyi történeteket. Ha nem is lettek hatalmas kedvencek, de hoztak egy, a könnyed kikapcsolódáshoz teljesen megbízható színvonalat. Most is ennyit vártam, meg is kaptam, sőt, ez a Harlequin-történet még jobb is volt egy fokkal. Tetszett. :)
Az írónőtől olvastam már angyalkás és karácsonyi történeteket. Ha nem is lettek hatalmas kedvencek, de hoztak egy, a könnyed kikapcsolódáshoz teljesen megbízható színvonalat. Most is ennyit vártam, meg is kaptam, sőt, ez a Harlequin-történet még jobb is volt egy fokkal. Tetszett. :)
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews