Author: Karen Templeton

Review: A Gift for All Season by Karen Templeton

Posted December 3, 2012 by Rowena in Reviews | 1 Comment

Review: A Gift for All Season by Karen TempletonReviewer: Rowena
A Gift for All Seasons (Summer Sisters, #2) by Karen Templeton
Series: Summer Sisters #2
Publisher: Harlequin, Harlequin Special Edition
Publication Date: October 16th 2012
Genres: Contemporary Romance
Pages: 224
Add It: Goodreads
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four-stars
Series Rating: four-stars

Hiring Patrick Shaughnessy to landscape her new inn was strictly a business arrangement. Until April Ross got to know the war-scarred single father …and his irrepressible little girl. Patrick made it clear he wasn't looking for romance. Neither was April. But could she make him see that some risks were worth taking?

The lively, widowed blonde might be the most tempting woman Patrick had ever known, but the returning vet knew a happy ending wasn't in the cards. Still, that was before April started working her magic on his daughter …and on him. Maybe this Christmas was a time for new beginnings — if Patrick had the courage to go with the powerful feelings April had awakened in him….

I haven’t read too many books by Karen Templeton and I’m not quite sure why.  The few that I have read, I’ve enjoyed a lot so I really need to get over myself and read more of her stuff.

With the holidays just around the corner, I picked this story up and thought that it would get me into the holiday spirit and I think it has.

This book follows April Ross and Patrick Shaughnessy.  April came into a lot of money is a restoring her grandmother’s big ol’ house and turning it into a B&B.  She’s hired Patrick to help with the landscaping and right from the start, there’s an attraction simmering under the surface for the both of them.  Now, Patrick is scarred from the war and when April first sees him, she sees the side of him that hides the scars.  When she sees the scars, she’s taken aback by them and Patrick sees her reaction to them and swears off of her before they even go there.  But the more time he spends with her, the more he wants to put himself out there again but his insecurities about his new lot in life come to the surface time and time again.

I thought that April was really patient with Patrick.  She spent a lot of time trying to get him to be comfortable with the fact that she was attracted to him, scars and all.  Throw in a little girl who is still hurting from the popping in and out of her life that her mother is doing, things are more than little complicated….but April knows what she wants and she spends the whole of this book trying to make Patrick see that he wants it too.

It would have been so easy for me to become highly annoyed with Patrick and his attitude toward dating, toward April and toward well, everything in his life but Templeton did a great job of making me understand where he’s coming from and why he’s acting the way that he’s acting.  When he finally allows himself to love and be loved by April, I grinned like a crazy person.

This was an enjoyably sweet romance that I’m glad that I read.  I definitely recommend.

Grade: 4 out of 5

This book is available from Harlequin Special Editions. You can buy it here or here in e-format. This book was provided by the publisher for an honest review.

four-stars


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Review: Baby, I’m Yours by Karen Templeton

Posted March 21, 2008 by Holly in Reviews | 6 Comments

Review: Baby, I’m Yours by Karen TempletonReviewer: Holly
Baby, I'm Yours by Karen Templeton
Series: Guys and Daughters #3
Publisher: Silhouette
Publication Date: April 1st 2008
Genres: Fiction
Pages: 224
Add It: Goodreads
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five-stars
Series Rating: five-stars

All Kevin Vaccaro had wanted to do, when he went looking for his ex-girlfriend on the other side of the country, was to apologize for not fighting harder to help her overcome the same drug and alcohol dependency issues that had held him in bondage for years. Except his ex is dead...leaving behind a baby girl. Jobless, homeless, clean for barely a year, how the hell is Kevin supposed to prove to Pippa’s grandfather – and her widowed aunt, the baby’s primary caregiver – that he deserves custody of his own child?

Julianne McCabe knows letting Kevin stay in her father’s house for a month – Victor Booth’s condition for even considering eventually giving Kevin custody – means very possibly having to give up the child she loves as her own. If Kevin takes Pippa away, Julianne’s heart will break. But even worse, watching Kevin’s fight to earn her father’s – and Julianne’s – trust threatens to dissolve the safe cocoon she’s woven around herself since her husband’s death.

And that will never do...

Have you ever read a book so good you almost don’t know what to say about it? Or how to properly express it’s greatness? That’s what happened to me with this book. (And also with Meljean Brook’s Demon Night. Just so you know)

I reviewed the first two books in this series at The Good, The Bad and The Unread. We’re introduced to the hero of this novel in the first book, Dear Santa, and see him again in the second, Yours, Mine…or Ours. I loved both the first two books in the series, but this is the one I wanted more than anything. Right from the beginning Kevin intrigued me, and I’m happy to report I wasn’t disappointed.

Kevin is a recovering drug and alcohol addict and I’m woman enough to admit this turned me off some even before I started reading. Yes, I’m shallow like that. Partly because I know some real life addicts who’ve proclaimed to be clean while not (and I have a suspicious nature and tend to be cynical) and partly because I’ve read other books about recovering addicts where they were portrayed as villainous or in an unflattering way, so I was somewhat prejudiced.

But despite my apprehension going in, I loved this book. Kevin is a wonderfully simple, yet complex, character. We can see that though he struggled in his past, he wants to be clean and he wants to be a better man. He still struggles, but he overcomes.

When he learns he has a daughter, his reaction is amazingly real. It’s not “Oh, I love her already” and it’s not “Oh gosh, I never wanted this” but instead it’s a mix of the two. A, “Holy shit, what do I do now” kind of thing. And I think that’s as close to real as you can get from a man who’s just starting to put the pieces of his life back together. But the way he steps up, the way he immediately does what he needs to do to be the man his daughter needs him to be..well, that’s the measure of a real man, in my opinion.

Julianne is also a complex, real character. She was widowed young, and by a man she loved more than life. I think in her situation (and having just married the man of my dreams, I can truly put myself where she was – er, minus the loss) is one which all of us fear, and her reaction to it – to draw a protective bubble around herself and hide from life – was how most of us would choose to react. The thing is, too many times an author can’t express this kind of pain without making the heroine seem stupid, or cowardly. Karen Templeton not only captured it perfectly, but she had me in tears several time, as I watched Julianne’s shell slowly crack open.

And I have to tell you, the end of this book, the thing that Kevin does? It totally tore me apart. I actually sobbed. Not just sniffled, or got misty eyed, or cried a little, but literally sobbed. Because, crap, that was ROUGH. And totally selfless.

This is one of those novels that’s very character driven and shows two people who grow and change, because of the help of the other. Simply amazing. A warning, though, it is somewhat on the sweet side, and I know some of you don’t enjoy that.

I just can’t say enough about this book. Although the previous two books are well done and wonderful, this one far outshines them. It was well written, emotional, poignant, real and had just enough humor to keep it balanced. Go forth and buy.

Karen Templeton is now my new favorite author, and one I feel the need to glom. Join me, won’t you?

5 out of 5

The official release date for this book is April 1, 2008, but I it’s on sale now, here or here in eBook format.

P.S. To gush just a bit more, this book inspired the epiphany I had here and the trouble I had here.

five-stars


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