Адска болка в главата, амнезия, сексапилен мъж в леглото и мистериозна кражба — как да осъзнаеш цялата тази информация, когато дори нямаш идея къде се намираш? Ала като истинска представителка на рода Макензи — Марис Макензи ще се изправи пред всяко предизвикателство, изпречило се на пътя й, към Магията на любовта.
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.
Linda S. Howington is an American best-selling romance author writing under the pseudonym Linda Howard. After 21 years of penning stories for her own enjoyment, she submitted a novel for publication which was very successful. Her first work was published by Silhouette in 1982. She is a charter member of Romance Writers of America and in 2005 Howard was awarded their Career Achievement Award.
Linda Howard lives in Gadsden, Alabama with her husband, Gary F. Howington, and two golden retrievers. She has three grown stepchildren and three grandchildren.
Let me start of by saying that I hated Maris’ story being a novella…I feel cheated, she is a Mackenzie, the same as the boys so deserved her own full story.
It was a cute little story and I am sorry to keep banging on about it, but it was just too short!…Everything felt rushed and because of the constraint of page space this story suffered…it had so much potential, it could have been a really special story if it was full length.
Maris is a horse trainer and discovers that her employers are going to kill off ‘Sole Pleasure’, one of their champion race horses. ‘Pleasure’ is now due to go into retirement and be sold off as a stud horse, but the owners realise that he has a low sperm count making him worthless as he will unlikely sire a foal so decide to kill him off for the insurance money. As Maris runs off to save him she is hit on the head. She wakes up and finds herself in bed with Alex who is one of the workers in the stables and she cannot remember how she got there or the events of the past 24 hours. Slowly they put the pieces of the jigsaw together and eventually save the horse, and it turns out that Alex is actually an FBI agent who is on the trail and investigating a killer.
I was that annoyed I was all prepared to give it a 2 star rating, but then I got to the end and saw an epilogue. I love epilogues in my romance stories and believe that all should have one. This epilogue was brilliant! We got to see more of little Nick (Zane & Barrie’s little girl), she is a lovely little character and I just love how all the Mackenzie men (and I will include Alex in that heading as in my mind he is now a Mackenzie) just melt around her.
As far as I am concerned it was Sole Pleasure and Nick who stole the show and saved this story and increased the rating from 2 to 3 stars for me.
Very enjoyable novella featuring the only female MacKenzie sibling, Maris, and Mac, the sexy FBI agent that she falls in love with. My favorite part of this book is the end at MacKenzie's mountain with the family...little Nick stole the show!
This little novella came as a real letdown for me. I've been happily working my way through the MacKenzie series and was really looking forward to Maris's story. After hearing endless references to Maris in all the other books, I couldn't wait to see what Howard would do for Wolf and Mary's only daughter. And the premise of this book was great. If it had been a full-length novel instead of this short novella I probably would have loved it. But instead the great premise only serves to tease and irritate me with the glimpse of what might have been. Out of all the children for Howard to have written a short novella about, why did she pick Maris?? As much as I enjoyed reading Wolf, Joe, Zane and Chance's stories, they were all kind of the same. Our big, tough, manly hero has to protect his woman from some kind of evil. But with Maris as the protagonist of the book, I was looking forward to seeing a tiny but strong and independent spitfire of a heroine taking the world by storm. Instead we get a rushed story with weak villains and an extremely improbably insta-love for the two main characters. What a horrible disappointment.
All in all, just a very disappointing story. There was so much potential here if this had been made into a full length book. If the horse-killers plot had taken longer to solve and in the meantime Maris and Mac were thrown together and soon gave into their combustible passion, ultimately falling in love. That would have been a great story. Instead we've got this unbelievable insta-love and a very weak villain plot that didn't make a ton of sense. What a letdown.
Ha sido un relato corto, que sigue el mismo patrón de las historias anteriores con su “mega instant love”.
Tenía curiosidad por la historia de la única hermana Mackenzie, pero no ha sido una historia memorable.
Voy a leer el último libro de esta serie porque odio dejarme algún libro atrás, simple cabezonería, pero sinceramente, de esta serie, el único libro que me ha gustado ha sido el segundo.
Mweh. No romance at all. No steamy hot scenes. They slept together once which was dealt with in a few sentences. I don’t remember them kissing even one time.
In the beginning of the book she doesn’t remember his name but within a few pages she suddenly realizes she is in love with him and she wants to marry him (huh?). They solve a crime and then they marry. That’s it.
No entiendo porqué Maris tiene un libro tan cortito, es la única mujer después de 5 varones, ella merece más que esto🤧.
Me he encariñado tanto con esta familia, que de verdad no puedo parar de sonreír cada que leo que la familia está completa. Han pasado tantos años desde los sucesos del primer libro y es impresionante la felicidad y abundancia que han obtenido todos los miembros de esta familia.
Alex y Maris son muy bonitos, me hubiera gustado leer más sobre los dos, la historia daba para más🥴, aún así, me encantó. Alex se ve que ha sido bien recibido por el clan Mackenzie y también se nota que quiere mucho a su esposa así que estoy de lo más feliz okay🤠.
Wolf es uno se mis personajes favoritos, de verdad que él y Mary han sido padres ejemplares y hay una parte donde casi se me salen las lágrimas porque se ve que quiere a cada uno de sus hijos, nietos y nueras. No sé qué decirles, está no es una saga excelente pero tiene lo suyo y el cariño ya lo tiene de mi parte🤪.
"—Empezaba a preguntarme si alguna vez te olvidarías de los caballos y te enamorarías de alguien. Pero ahora que lo has hecho, me parece que no te tuvimos a nuestro lado suficiente tiempo."
Maris, the only daughter of Wolf and Mary Mackenzie, has no idea how she ended up in bed with the hired help; a giant goose egg on the back of her head has made her forget most of what happened the night before. But the gentle care of Alex “Mac” Macneil reassures her she’s in the right hands.
Mac had no idea the woman in charge of one of the most famous race horses in the country was hurt as badly as she was when he put her to bed the night before, but he’s determined to keep her safe and far away from the mess they landed themselves in when they apparently kidnapped the prized thoroughbred under her care.
But Mac also has no idea the steely determination bred in Maris Mackenzie- nor how strong the almost magical pull she has on him is about to become. Once Maris sets her mind on something she sees it through to the end- and there’s one thing she knows for certain; Mac is hers and she is his and marriage is soon to follow. Her almost fey ability to see into things tells her that with the help of her family, everything else will sort itself out… including the mystery of who is trying to kill Sole Pleasure.
This entry in LH’s Mackenzie family is tightly packed. It catches us up with some of our favorite characters and gives Maris her HEA, although all of us hoped for a little more. Still... its' not to be overlooked despite its short length.
Five over protective brothers & a fierce warrior of a father have made romance a bit of a challenge for Mavis Mackenzie . . . that and her love of horses. No one is more surprised than her when she falls for an alpha warrior of her own - one she wakes up in bed with - with no memory of his name or the events of the night before. Oh my! Let the games begin!! A great, short story that warms the heart...and sheets! A Must Read!
I'm torn between 3 and 4 stars. I liked it a lot but I felt it was too short and we missed something. Maris MacKenzie, part of Linda Howard's MacKenzie Family, wakes up in a strange room with a headache and a drifter. The drifter is a temporary helper at the horse farm where she trains horses. Apparently, she stole a horse and is on the run and recruited Alex MacNeil to help her.
A nice little novella. I loved Maris and Mac and it was great to see all of the MacKenzie's together. There was some insta-love and the side plot about who was killing the horses was interesting.
Fluffy, lightweight novella with typical romance novel characters. Not enough time for relationship development.
MACKENZIE'S MAGIC by Linda Howard.
STORY BRIEF: Maris is a horse trainer. Someone plans to harm her favorite horse, and Maris is hit in the head. She wakes up in a motel room the next day with a concussion. Mac is with her. He was recently hired to work with her on the horse farm. Together they try to figure out what is going on and what to do about it. Maris has no memory of what she was doing before she was injured. Maris realizes she is attracted to Mac.
REVIEWER’S OPINION: This was about half the length of a typical romance novel. It was a “falling in lust” story. There was no time for any relationship development. It was shallow. I wanted more intrique, unique characters, and more interesting plot and dialogue. But if you loved the series, you might like this out of curiosity.
After the mystery and danger is over, a chunk of time is spent with Maris’ family in Wyoming. There is the cute little toddler, all the hunky men, their wives and children. Everyone is loving and protective. It was a pleasant time.
OTHER BOOKS: There are five Mackenzie books. The first three were much better than books 4 and 5. This is book 4. For a list of my reviews of all five books, see my 5 star review of Burn posted 7-11-09.
CAUTION SPOILER: I didn’t understand the scene in which Maris was hit in the head (which was told and not shown). Apparently the bad guy was starting to inject the horse when Maris arrived. He hits her in the head causing a concussion, but she is able to get on the horse and ride away. Can one be concussed and still mount and ride? Why couldn’t the bad guy finish the injection as she was mounting? I wanted more details and showing, not telling.
DATA: Kindle count story length: 1462. Swearing language: mild. Sexual language: mild. Number of sex scenes: 1, about a page long. Setting: current day mostly Kentucky and Wyoming. Copyright: 1996. Genre: contemporary romance.
Audio narrated by Dennis Boutsikaris. He did a decent job, but it's not an outstanding performance. This is a novella -- Book 4 in the Mackenzie Family series. The romance is not convincing and neither is the suspense plot, involving horse-racing insurance fraud and murder. Not enough relationship development between horse-whisperer Maris Mackenzie and FBI agent Alex MacNiel (Mac). Maris knew she loved Mac immediately. He took a wee bit longer. Maris and Mac engage in some sleuthing around to save the prize thoroughbred, Sole Pleasure. I was confused by the concussion train of events. The story includes one sex scene.
There is a feel-good, family-oriented winter wedding scene in Wyoming, with adorable little Nick stealing the show as flower girl. Chance Mackenzie, the hero of the sequel A Game Of Chance gets to play hero in the epilogue.
In a perfect world, every book in this series would have gotten 1 1/2 stars from me. 1/2 star for the writing, plot, etc. and 1 star for the comedic value. I mean, really, how is she a best selling author? My favorite part was when she magically created an adopted brother, so that she could write about another Mackenzie finding a 29 year old virgin, who had never had a relationship before, falling in love with her and getting married in the space of days. Too funny!
Este relato tan breve (la más corta de las historias de la familia Mackenzie) se lee en un suspiro. Alex MacNeil es un agente del FBI infiltrado en un rancho de caballos. Justo donde trabaja Maris Mackenzie, la pequeña del clan. Por exigencias del guion, ella empieza la novela medio desnuda, en una cama de motel con él, y sin memoria de lo que acaba de ocurrir. No, no es que haya bebido más de la cuenta. Es que ha tenido un encontronazo con el malo de la película. Es suspense ligero, de una extensión tan limitada que no hay mucho espacio para desarrollar los personajes ni para elaborar una trama intrincada de misterio. Se lee rápido y con interés, aunque al final no tenga nada especial.
There's a kernel of a good story here. A plot awaits to unfold. The romance author buried it all in far too many pages of romance and sex. I get that is obviously her goal. The problem with that is the writing of instant romance with a person incarcerated and should be scared. Instead all is taken as a sexual thrill. A pretty twisted person would become like this and only a similar mind would take advantage of it. There is a semblance of very good writing here, also detoured as the tale unfolds. Real trouble is that this is part of a Christmas collection, where Christmas is mentioned a couple times as an aside. Due to the uber-romance focus the intriguing plot is defused and left trampled by hoofs in the snow.
Bottom line: I don't recommend this book. 3 out of ten points.
I was happy to see that Maris had moved to Kentucky for this short update. Another whirlwind romance, which was fine, and a surprisingly reluctant trip to the bedroom, which was also fine. I would have liked more time on the horse, or just to see Maris do what she does best, but as an addendum to the family saga it works. I wouldn't advise it as a stand-alone, though.
3/5 Relato demasiado corto y demasiado rápido. Está empezando la historia, muy precipitadamente, y antes de darte cuenta ya ha terminado. Te falta casi todo.
Maris is the only daughter of Wolf & Mary Mackenzie and just like Wolf she has a gift with horses. When she discovers that someone is threatening to harm one of her favorite horses on the ranch where she works as lead trainer Maris takes the horse to protect him only she doesn’t remember doing it due to a concussion she doesn’t remember getting and she definitely doesn’t remember how she ends up in bed with Mac, the sexy ranch hand who works with her!! Now it’s up to Mac who’s actually a undercover FBI Agent, to keep Maris safe and find out who wants to harm the prized horse.
I really enjoyed this short story and I loved catching up with all of the Mackenzie’s, I loved little Nick, she definitely stole the show!!!
I wish that the sole story about the girl-offspring was a full length book and and not a novella. I mean, the booksabouttheboys are only category length anyway, so why did Maris get short-changed? There was a lot of potential that could have been fully utilized with 100 or so more pages. I'm okay with the fact that not all of the kids got their own books, I'm just a little resentful that the only girl got half a story.
Maris Mackenzie's story starts with her waking up in a stranger's bed, unable to remember the last few hours of her life. She has apparently stolen one of the horses she's been training and Alex MacNeil, an undercover cop who has been investigating the family she worked for, is her accomplice.
Alex suspected Maris for a while, but stealing the horse to save its life clears her of all suspicion and makes the situation more dangerous for her, since her amnesia was caused by someone hitting her.
The two must solve the mystery of the dead thoroughbreds before the killers find them, and while working together, they end up succumbing to the attraction between them.
Short but sweet, giving Maris the happy ending she deserves.
Reread 11/2025 This was still really sweet and fast paced. I enjoyed it but I wanted more from them in the epilogue. I still wanted more because their feelings developed very fast.
***
A cute installment in the Mackenzie series.
I wish that her story was a bit longer. I liked that we are thrown into the drama and learn about them from there. As much as I love Nick (Zane's daughter) I think she took up too much of the story at the end. I wanted more time with Maris and Mac.
This could also be a holiday romance because the last part of the book takes place around Christmas.
If I'd found this in an anthology of short stories, I might have liked it more, but being asked to swallow it as an actual novel just ticked me off. When it started seemingly in the middle of a story, I was intrigued. When the suspense plot ended within about 5 seconds and the hero and heroine fell in love even faster, I was annoyed. The rest of the story was wedding hijinks; I was bored.
Surprisingly, this book isn't as "boom" as the previous ones. I don't know, I guess it's because I'm attracted by Mackanzie's men and in this book, the Mackanzie is Maris, the only daughter. So..
Overall I enjoyed it, though at first it was a bit confusing. Nick, Zane's little girl is UH-MA-ZING! I wanna read her own book someday!!