Revisit the unforgettable Calhoun sisters in these two remarkable stories about love and family from #1 New York Times bestselling author NORA ROBERTS
A Man for Amanda
A slow, sexy drawl was all Amanda Calhoun heard when she walked into the wall of denim and muscle that was Sloan O'Riley, the architect hired to renovate her family's magnificent ancestral estate, the Towers. No-nonsense Amanda found Sloan's easygoing manner infuriating. But his irresistible smile was growing harder and harder to resist.
For the Love of Lilah
Adrift in a storm, Professor Max Quartermain thought he must have hallucinated the beautiful mermaid who came to his rescue. But Lilah was no mystical creature she was a woman of flesh and blood, and undeniably attracted to the intense and mysterious stranger.
Nora Roberts is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of more than 200 novels, including Hideaway, Under Currents, Come Sundown, The Awakening, Legacy, and coming in November 2021 -- The Becoming -- the second book in The Dragon Heart Legacy. She is also the author of the futuristic suspense In Death series written under the pen name J.D. Robb. There are more than 500 million copies of her books in print.
The Calhoun Women: Amanda and Lilah is by Nora Roberts. It is a compilation of two books following the lives of two of the four Calhoun girls. It is an intriguing novel with loads of excitement as well as romance. I simply loved it. Amanda Calhoun was the sensible and organized one of the four Calhoun girls. They were brought up by their Aunt Coco who held séances and believed in family ghosts. Suzanne was the emotionally frail one. She had been married to a brute and a liar and got out of the marriage with her two young children. She was still trying to get back to being the self-confident girl she had once been. Lilah was fey. She knew things she shouldn’t have known and she blended well with the mysteriousness of The Towers, their home. She seemed dreamy and scatterbrained but was indeed very much put together. CC. was simply in love. She was to marry Trent St. James of the St. James hotel family. After their marriage, they were staying on at The Towers while one wing was changed into rooms as part of the hotel chain. Trent had asked his friend Sloan O’Riley to draw up the plans for the renovation of The Towers. Sloan agreed but didn’t have any notion of getting involved with anyone while he was here. Fortunately, he literally ran into Amanda and changed both of their lives. Would Amanda ever get a change to manage The Towers or would Sloan take her away from here? Could the rumor of the missing emeralds of Great- grandmother Bianca being hidden in The Towers actually be true? Why did Sloan look at Suzanne as if he hated her before even knowing her? Book two is about Lilah. Lilah is a naturalist and likes to physically be busy. She believed in instinct and premonition. She sometimes felt the presence of Great- Grandmother Bianca. Now she was getting the feeling that a something bad was coming. She didn’t know where it would come from; but it was coming. She felt the need to go down to watch the storm that was thundering overhead. Little did she know that she was to save a life. Max Quartermain was an American history professor who wanted to write a novel. The research Ellis Caufield wanted him to do involving papers from the 1920’s, was going to give him the research he needed as well as the money to take a year off to write his novel. Now he was aboard Caufield’s yacht in the middle of a storm and was getting seasick. As he headed topside to get some air, he heard Caufield and Captain Hawkins talking. He heard they were thieves and were using him to get information about some jewels which they would steal. When Caufield realized Max had heard everything, he told Captain Hawkins to lock Max in his room. Max ran for topside. When he was finally cornered, he did what he knew he had to do but didn’t know if he would survive, he jumped overboard! He sensed rather than knew that someone was in the water to help him. They battled the waves and the sea until they reached shore. He looked at the face above him and saw its ethereal beauty and lots of red hair. He mumbled that she was real and that he hadn’t believed in mermaids. Then he passed out. What will happen now? Will Caufield find the emeralds? Will Max be able to help himself and the girls? This too is a great book.
I guess romance just isn't my genre. I tried. Too unrealistic about how the characters fall in love. Both the men instantly fell wildly, madly in love with the women at first glance? Lilah gets ticked because her suitor says she's "beautiful"?... Amanda's man has this disappointing habit of wanting to spend money on her? yeah alright....
Both men seem overly possessive and jealous instantly. Not cool down the road when they lock up Amanda and Lilah in the house so that they won't have to be jealous of them being seen by other people or beat them for saying hi to someone on the street.
But then maybe I'm missing the point. Isn't reading supposed to be an escape from the ordinary? Maybe romance books are supposed to be a fantasy - something that doesn't happen in real life. Maybe that's the fun of it.
Still though - I would like to see a "real life" romance book, you know - where the suitor constantly talks about how beautiful -- his *ex* is, or how, after 1 date, he asks to move in/use your car.
I gave it an extra star though. I did actually like the Calhoun's and the mystery / architecture overtones to the books and I'm sure it's a fine book if you like romance to start out with.
A Man for Amanda: Amanda Calhoun finds architect Sloan O'Riley insufferable and irresistible. He's been hired by her new brother-in-law to fix up the west wing of The Towers that will ultimately be The Towers Retreat and his Oklahoma easy going ways rub Amanda the wrong way from the beginning. As the two grow closer, the legend of the Calhoun emeralds brings a thief into the Calhoun women's lives and a race to solve the old mystery and find the necklace begins.
For the Love of Lilah: Lilah is the free spirit of the Calhouns and the one that most resembles her great-grandmother Bianca. When she feels the need to head to the sea during a storm she has no idea why until she sees a man in the water. Not thinking about it, she heads out to save him. Max has been shot at by the man who is after the emeralds but he can't remember anything after being in the water so long. When he realizes what happened he decides to work with the Calhouns to help find the emeralds and stop the thief. And he just happens to fall for Lilah along the way.
DNF - even the first one. While Roberts is a good writer, her topics are so antiquated and really belong in the Harlequin category. It IS an old copyright - 2015 - and I'm sure there is an audience for her novels but I guess I'm just jaded and have a hard time enjoying a novel when you KNOW from the 2nd page, who is going to fall in love with whom and basically how it's going down. She does throw in some good sub-topics - in this case, the theft of some family jewels - but it wasn't enough to keep me going. I got through 3/4 of the Lilah one but couldn't take it any more. I was listening on CD while I was driving a long distance and NEEDED something to listen to - otherwise, I probably would have stopped earlier. Sorry Nora. I DO know there is an audience for your novels and they are happy when you come out with a new one. So bravo to that.
I'm not sure how much I disliked this because of the narration and how much was because of the story, but it was probably both.
The rhythm the narrator used sounded wrong to me, which didn't help to start with, but what really annoyed me was the basic storyline in A Man for Amanda. I found the behaviour of one of the main characters awful and bordering on abuse. He would not take no for an answer and just kept putting on the pressure.
Be aware that this starts with the second story in the series. The story starts with Catherine's story that is not in this edition. The books are fun, though you can tell they are from before current technology.
I think I have my chick flick book reading out of my system now...kind of like the time I went through a phase of wanting to watch the cheesy Olsen twin films when I was in my mid-twenties. Sometimes you need light and fluffy.