You Gave Away How Much???? "This Heart of Mine" by Susan Elizaberth Phillips

Molly Somerville knows she has a reputation for trouble. She did give away her inheritance, but hey, nobody is perfect. Still, if anyone has an almost perfect life, it's Molly. While her Daphne the Bunny children's books could be selling better, she loves her cramped loft, her French poodle, and her career creating the animals who live in the fictional Nightingale Woods. She even loves her older sister, Phoebe, even though it was tough at first growing up in her shadow. Phoebe is beautiful, blissfully married, and owner of the most successful professional football team in America. But who other than your sister knows you are about to do something drastic everytime you change your hair? Yes, Molly is happy about almost everything except her crush on Stars' daredevil quarterback, that awful, gorgeous Kevin Tucker--a man who can't even remember her name.

Kevin's hidden depths and iron will propel Molly out of her comfortable existence into an unforgetable summer at a place called Wind Lake. Surrounded by paintbox cottages and an old bed-and-breakfast, Molly and Kevin battle their attraction while dealing with an aging sexpot actress, a cranky, world-famous artist, and a pair of teenage newlyweds. Their lives and careers are in crisis, but sometimes falling in love hurts, sometimes it makes you mad as hell, and sometimes it can heal in the most special and unexpected ways.

This fifth novel in the "Chicago Stars series" is set about 12 years after the first novel and finds the younger daughter of Bert Somerville at an interesting time of her life. She is approaching 30 years of age, has finished college and purchased her own small and cramped condo in an old, rennovated warehouse on Chicago's North side. Just a few years previously, in an effort to finally rid her life of her uncaring, mean, and controlling father (now dead), Molly had put her $15 million inheritance in a charitable foundation and was now having to earn her own living. But she felt like her own person for the first time in her life. If only she could find a way to get Kevin to even know she was alive. She had nurtured a crush on him since she was 16 years old for all the good it had done her, and she had almost come to the conclusion that her life was just fine the way it was. Let Kevin have his fashion models and his arm candy blondes; she was OK by herself.

Kevin, on the other hand, was in trouble. After nearly a decade of almost legendary performance with the Chicago Stars, he had sustained a shoulder injury that required surgery, and now he was having to face up to the possibility that he was indeed mortal, and the end of his pro career was just a few years away. Now he finds himself on suspension after some daredevil stunts that put his safety and physical wellbeing at risk. His past was beginning to intrude on his fast and furious life as well--his last remaining relative had died and left him an aging old Methodist church campground--built by his grandfather on the Upper Peninsula of Michigan--and now all his. Due to some very bazaare, hurtful, and angering circumstances, Molly and Kevin find their lives entwined, if for only a few months, and Kevin drags her to the old campground, thinking it was uninhabited. He plans to close it and sell the property and rid himself of that part of his history. Surprise!! It is now a thriving and popular summer resort and fully booked through September.

This is such an interesting novel and will take the reader from humor to tears and back again. Molly & Kevin's story is strange and convoluted, to say the least, but the background characters are strong and interesting, bringing an unexpected flavor and some surprising aspects to their story. The characters from several of the preceeding novels in this series again make an appearance, and the description of the family/friends impromptu softball game--the Jocks vs the Last Kids Chosen in Gym Class--is an absolute hoot. SEP has this marvelous sense of humor and it breaks through in all her writing.

Perhaps the most compelling aspect of all SEP's novels is the way she brings in personal issues that are often not the subject of romance fiction. Kevin's struggle with his past is never far below the surface and it keeps popping up at the most inopportune times. Molly's fears about being loved for herself, her fierce independence and insistence on taking care of herself testify to the fact that her past still rules her inner life more than she realizes. Family and friends are important and they form a colorful background to the main story. The "side" stories are a delight in themselves as they impinge on Molly & Kevin's journey. All the characters have glaring flaws--they are all completely human. All of them have to deal with the pressures of a world that isn't very very kind or forgiving. Each deals with hidden hurts, old secrets, fears that have been shoved and buried for decades, and relationships that suffer as a result. SEP simply doesn't back away from those and thus, the reader gets a dose of humanity that is captivating and compelling.

There are gazillions of good books "out there" and serious romance readers know that to be the fact. But there are just some books that keep drawing us back, keep making us deal with the realities of human experience, even though they may not exactly match the reader's personal journey. This is one of those books. It is one that contains so much that a reader cannot possibly catch all the nuances of the story in a single time through. And I happen to be one of those readers who feel like I want to know these people better and for that reason alone, I keep on going back and re-reading these novels. This one is so full of good stuff and so well written that it is just as interesting the second or third time through.



If you have not read any of the Chicago Stars series, you can start anywhere in the series, but I would recommend that you read them all. By the time you have completed book seven, you will indeed feel as if you know some of these characters like good friends and neighbors. I give this novel a 4.5 out of 5.

Gone But Not Forgotten: The Super Bowl Is Over But The Books Keep Coming! "Dream A Little Dream" by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

A Desperate young mother . . . Rachel Stone's bad luck has taken a turn for the worse. With an empty wallet, a car that's spilling smoke, and a five-year-old son to support, she's come home to a town that hates her. But this determined young widow with a scandalous past has learned how to be a fighter and a survivor. Ande she'll do anything to keep her child safe--even take on . . . A man with no heart . . .

Gabe Bonner wants to be left alone, e specially by the beautiful outcast who's invaded his property. She has a tone of attitude, a talent for trouble, and a child who brings back bad memories. Yet Rachel's feisty spirit might just be heaven-sent to save a tough, stubborn man.

Dare to Dream . . . Welcome to Salvation, North Carolina--where a man who's fogtotten what tenderness means meets a woman with nothing to lose. Here two endearing lovers will set off on a funny, touching journey of the heart . . . to a place where dreams just might come true.

Well, Super Bowl #45 is over and the Green Bay Packers are champs. Still think it should have been my Chicago Bears!! But that's life, and it was a very good game--not a "yawner" like some have been. I have debated on whether I should continue with the football-related reviews and have decided it is only fair to a writer like Ms Phillips to put out these books before my followers and whoever else might be "lurking" around the blogging world. This series is just too good to miss and I think, down deep, I just want to share them and write about my responses to them.

Dream A Little Dream is book 4 in this "Chicago Stars series" and is really a bit of a sidetrack and a take-off from book 3. Legendary Chicago Stars' quarterback, Cal Bonner (who was featured in book 3) has now retired and is in his first year of medical school at the University of North Carolina. His youngest brother, Ethan, is still pastoring at a church in Salvation, the little town where they were all raised and to which Cal returned when he and his wife were first married. Brother Gabe Bonner was only briefly mentioned in book 3 as having lost his family in a tragic auto accident and who was "hiding out" in Mexico, trying to find a way through his overwhelming grief. In fact, the deaths of Charity and Jamie Bonner deeply affected each member of the family.

Gabe Bonner has now returned to Salvation, all at the behest of his brothers who went after him and got him into rehab after his year-long descent into alcohol and drugs in Mexico. A veterinarian by profession, he has now purchased the defunct drive-in theater in Salvation with the goal of restoring it and once again opening it for the town's enjoyment. His spirt is battered, his emotions are safely tucked away under the veneer of a man who has no kindness or tenderness any longer. He is living in Cal's house--the house once owned by DeWayne Snopes, a televangelist who conned millions out of his followers and who died trying to escape the law.

Lo and behold, who should show up on his property--the "Pride of the Carolinas" drive-in--but the Widow Snopes who had her name legally changed by to her maiden name, but who is instantly recognized in Salvation, in spite of her ragged clothing, her dead car, and her thin and hungry eyes, face, and body. She is Rachel Stone, and she is on a mission to try and find some assets that were overlooked by her dead husband in the hopes of some sort of resource to keep her child fed and safe. She knows somehow that all that money her husband absconded with can't possibly be at the bottom of the Atlantic. And for her child's sake, she is willing to endure anything to perhaps find something that may have been left behind.

Now she finds herself pinned by Gabe Bonner's dislike, his unkindness, his growling, his mean spirit. Yet she responds by refusing to go away, by insisting on working for Gabe Bonner as he repairs and restores the drive-in, somehow realizing that this is her very last chance to preserve her's and her son's lives. She knew the Bonners from her former years in Salvation, but they really didn't know her at all. All they could remember was the televised shots of her that were interpreted by her conniving husband. They never knew that she hated him, knew of his corruption, was forced to allow him to use her and her son for his own criminal purposes because he had threatened to take away her son. Gabe didn't want to like her and he didn't. But her sass and her absolute determination to work and provide for her son, even to the point that she didn't eat (she gave every scrap of food she could find to the little boy) began to slither under Gabe's carefully constructed defenses. He found her a place to live and secretly paid for the boy's time at the local daycare center. All the while having to deal with the fact that Rachel was the first woman who had attracted him since his wife's death.

This is NOT an easy novel to read. Lots of pain and disappointment, with a deep and pervasive sense of loss. Loss on Rachel's part, because she had lost her home and any assets that could sustain her and her son, loss of friends and the goodwill of the community, and loss of any semblance of faith she may have every possessed. Certainly Gabe's loss was obvious as he still couldn't seem to move on from the death of his family. But he also suffered the loss of his motivation for living, the loss of his love for people and animals, loss of any emotional response to those around him, and loss of the ability to see beyond his own pain. Just a novel filled with hurt. But it is also a novel that displays the magnificence of the human spirit to survive just about the worst that life can bring, the wonder of a mother's love that is willing to endure anything in order to care for and preserve her son and his future, the deep caring of a family that is willing to do whatever it takes to bring one of their own back to sanity, safety, and full participation in living. It is also a novel that chronicles a journey of discovery for Rachel and Gabe, but also for Ethan Bonner who has sort of lost himself in his ministry, who needs to find the rationale for his future, who is still trying to find his way in spite of his "calling." And of course, the truth that comes through loud and clear on so many levels, just as the Good Book says: "Love endures all things . . ." There is redemption here and the reclaiming of faith, of the will to live, of the need to feel and experience. I think we all forget sometimes that even when we have been "laid low" by tragedy our inner wills and spirits insist that we only dwell in limbo just so long.

I have absolutely come to prize this entire series for lots of reasons. Having lived in Chicago throughout my life--off and on--I was immediately taken with the entire premise of a ficitonal professional football team and some of the individual stories connected to it. Now, having read all of them, I am a fan for many other reasons, not the least of which is the realization that SEP has taken the time and trouble to investigate and explore the regions of the human spirit and the capacity people possess to both feel and think, to despise and to love, to resist and embrace the power of love in their lives. Somehow this particular novel, of all seven in this series, goes deeper and is almost brutal in looking at the wounds people can inflict upon one another.

I hope, if you have not read this novel, that you will do so. First released in 1998, it has been around for a long time. But its message is timeless and, as always, SEP's writing is so very good. If you have already read this book, it well may be time to go back and read it again. It will exercise your emotions and pull at the heart strings, but so what? Is that not often what makes a romance novel live in our hearts? I give this book 4.5 out of 5.

The Genius & The Jock: "Nobody's Baby But Mine" by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

Genius physics professor Dr. Jane Darlington desperately wants a baby but doesn't want her child growing up, as she did, feeling like a super intelligent freak. So Jane needs someone . . . well . . . stupid to father her child, someone like legendary Chicago Stars' quarterback, Cal Bonner. But this good looking good ole boy is a lot smarter than he lets on--and Cal is not about to be used and abandoned by a brainy, baby-mad schemer.

This novel continues the "Chicago Stars series" and is the third in the series. The main characters are as different as night and day--one a brilliant, genius IQ professor who is unmarried but who wants a baby--her very own baby--but who truly has been marked and emotionally stunted by her family's response to her own brilliant intelligence. All her life she was lonely, out of sync with schoolmates--she was in college when most teens were in high school--and her only way of dealing with this was to immerse herself in her science research. She had relationships but her lack of confidence in her own femininity and social skills had left her hurting and worried that life was passing her by. So she concocted the idea that she needed to find a man who was really not very bright--a sperm bank usually took donors who were professional and with fairly hefty IQ's--someone she needed to convince to impregnate her the "old fashioned way." Through a series of rather bazarre events, Jane met up with Cal Bonner and because she was very good at timing her cycle, managed to get pregnant.

Cal Bonner actually found out about Jane's pregnancy and because of his Southern upbringing, insisted that he and Jane marry. No child of his was going to be born illegitimate!! He dragged her to Salvation, North Carolina, his home town and the community where his family lived, setting her up in an estate previously owned by a televangelist without a car or means of transportation, effectively shutting her off from his family and friends. She was expected to be content doing her research and essentially spending the days by herself. But Jane was more than what she appeared--not just a geeky scientist, but a woman with creativity and some ability to engage in original thinking. Somehow she made friends with Cal's hillbillie grandmother and together they spent the summer gardening together. She bought her own car--a beat-up, ten-year-old Escort which she did not hesitate to drive all over town, and causing Cal's friends to wonder why his wife was reduced to driving such a wreck.

Slowly but surely these two individuals learned some surprising depths to one another, surprises that moved them toward friendship and respect for each other. A side story was a fascinating look at the marriage of Cal's parents--nearly 40 years living together with love, but with some serious fissures of long standing. There are some wonderful moments in this novel and lots of humor. The dialogue is such fun--smart people can really be very funny--but there is deep hurt and pain here as well. Human relationships are messy and there are some really messy aspects to these relationships. That's why I found these characters to be so authentic. Just so very human, so flawed but interesting, so unique in their personal demeanor and expression. I think SEP has proven that she crafts characters that are real and it is this quality that makes it possible for readers to relate to characters.

This is also a novel about personal growth, about the struggle of moving out of one's comfort zone, of finding a way to manage one's response to life situations that are unexpected and which challenge all the responses and values that have guided a person in the past. It is also about charting the future in spite of one's fears, of being able to have sufficient faith in one's self to move forward rather than marching "in place." Jane had to consider what a future without Cal might look like, how their child could be happy with a mother and father who were not together, and deal with the fact that her feelings toward Cal are probably not returned. Cal had to face a future without football even though he was probably going to end up in the Hall of Fame. The coming season could well be his last year. What could he do or how could he fill his days when he retired? What really lay in store for him? Both had some very hard thinking to do.

This was a fascinating read and one I enjoyed immensely. I have found this series such fun and have read all but one of the six novels in the series. On this Super Bowl Sunday it has been interesting to me to consider the behind-the-scenes life circumstances the public often does not see with pro football players. Like all pro athletes the fans hear what the media can unearth about their lives, much of which is conjecture taken as fact. This novel is pure fiction, of course, but it resonated with me as a football wife and one who found the players of this fictional Chicago team so engaging. I give this novel a rating of 4.25 out of 5.

I May Look Great and Act Dumb, But Don't You Believe It: "Heaven, Texas" by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

Bobby Tom Denton was a wide receiver for the Chicago Stars, and was probably one of the greatest wide receivers in the NFL. He was Texas born and bred and held out for a very sizeable contract with the Stars each time his contract came up for renewal because he said they owed him extra money to play football somewhere else besides Texas. He was a good ole boy, with fast cars and fast women, all of whom were looking to be Mrs Bobby Tim Denton. But none of them could pass his football quiz. Now he was retired--a great big Neanderthal from the Chicago Bears had tackled him and blown out his knee. Goodbye career.

Gracie Snow was employed by Windmill Films to make sure that Bobby Tom Denton got to Telarosa, Texas, the site of the filming of his first movie and a gig he didn't necessarily want to play, even though he had signed the contract. Gracie was anything but graceful, but she wanted to badly to break out of her humdrum life and to finally manage to do something besides manage the home for the elderly which her family had run for years. In Gracie, Bobby Tom may have met an adversary that was going to take him down for count more effectively than any gridiron opponent he had ever met.

Telarosa, Texas was a little town that had seen better days. Its original name was Heaven, not because of its scenic beauty, but because it had the best whorehouses in that part of Texas. Eventually the people decided to change its name for obvious reasons. Bobby Tom Denton was their favorite son, one who had grown up there and made it to the big leagues. Now Windmill Films was going to use Telarosa to film and the town was also using Bobby Tom's time there to develop some civic activities and landmarks in order to bring more tourists into the area. It looked like the man who owned the only factory in those parts was thinking seriously of moving out of Telarose, effectively killing the town unless some other means of income was developed. It seemed that Bobby Tom was it.

Gracie Snow was NOT Bobby Tom's "type" of woman. In fact, even though she had a very good figure and was pretty enough, she had the fashion sense of a grocery bag and a very irritating way of figuring out that all his good ole boy jargon hid a very smart man who knew exactly what he was doing, in spite of the show he put on. She wasn't even aware that she had piqued his interest because she was smart, seemed to find ways of getting him to do things he didn't seem to want to do, and managed to get him to Telerosa--10 days late, but she got him there.

This is a very insightful book about a world class athlete whose brilliant career was cut short by an injury. He continued to be a chick magnet and to shoot the bull just about everywhere he went. His popularity didn't seem to be dimmed at all. But underneath was a very sad and troubled young man who didn't seem to know a direction for his future. Gracie Snow was a woman who really didn't know her own strengths, who really didn't appreciate her extraordinary ability with people, or recognize the need to do good for people that drove her. She also saw all the women who flocked around Bobby Tom and just "knew" that she had all the chances of an iceberg in Hell of ever catching his eye romantically. These two people became a part of each other's lives in curious ways, and their romance seemed to grow almost without their even being aware of it--except Gracie was very aware that she had fallen in love with him. She simply decided to appreciate the time she had as his "personal assistant" during the film shoot, and let that be her memory book when Bobby Tom moved on. Both these characters were forced, in one circumstance or another, to discover things about themselves that they weren't necessarily prepared to acknowledge--some really good things and some not so goo.

I found this book to be a fascinating look at small town life, at the struggles of a pro athlete to shape his life after playing days were over, at how individuals can really change the course of an entire community, and how caring and giving can effectively trump glitz and glamour. This novel is chock full of fun and there were times a just had to put the book down and spend some time laughing. SEP has such a wonderful way with words, and all these characters were so full of life. The citizens of Telerosa were amazing characters--many of whom are probably icons of people who inhabit small towns all over America. The background stories were fascinating, and the side story with Bobby Tom's mother and some of the other citizens of the town added flavor and spice to the novel. I have re-read it once already because I enjoyed to dialogue and repartee so much. It is just such a grand read!

This book was originally published in 1995, but I found it very appropriate for our times now, and hope that if you haven't had a chance to read it, you will get at your library or buy the book. It really is worth your time. And if you have not read any of SEP's work before, this is such a fun series to begin with. I give this book a rating of 4.25 out of 5.

The Bimbo & The Jock Make War & Peace: "It Had To Be You" by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

The Windy City isn't quite ready for Phoebe Somerville--the trendy, outrageous and curvaceous New York knockout who has just inherited the Chicago Stars professional football team. And Phoebe is definitely not prepared for the Stars' head coach Dan Calebo--an Alabama-born former gridiron legend and blond barbarian.

Calebo is everything Phoebe abhors--a sexist, jock taskmaster with a one-track mind. The beautiful new boss is everything Dan despises--a meddling bimbo who doesn't know pigskin from a pitcher's mound. So why is he drawn to the shameless sexpot like a heat-seeking missile? And why does Dan's good ol' boy charm leave cosmopolitan Phoebe feeling awkward, tongue-tied and frightened to death?

Suddenly there's more than just a championship at stake. Because passion's the name of this game--and two stubborn people are playing for keeps!

Phoebe Somerville really did set everyone in the Chicago Stars organization on edge--especially with all the problems the team and its management were facing. Bert Somerville, Phoebe's now deceased father was a selfish, power-seeking, I'll-do-it-my-way kind of guy. He had two wives, both of whom were Vegas showgirls who were blonde, tall, leggy, busty, and--according to him--dumb. He said he liked it that way. Phoebe and her sister Molly were both infected by his derision and neglect that his lack of caring. Their world was totally lacking any kind of loving kindness, especially after each of the wives departed, both were now dead.

Now Phoebe had to take over the team ownership and had to prove her worth as a sharp and insightful business woman, but there was a catch. If the Stars didn't win the AFC championship, the ownership would revert to her cousin who was just like her dad. And the way the Stars were playing, with attendance dropping and the front office full of arguing and conflict, a championship was the least likely thing to happen.

Enter Dan Calebo, a man who absolutely despised Phoebe and everything he thought she cared about. Forget that he had a penchant for Chicago's most glamorous "eye candy" to hang on his arm, and thought every woman had an IQ of 50. He hated the way she dressed, he hated her seeming lack of interest in the future of the team, he even hated her frou frou poodle. Yet there was something about Phoebe that kept drawing him in--mostly to argue with her and to get upset with her--at least at first.

This book was a real joy for me. I grew up around Chicago--from the time I was 6 years old until I was a senior in high school, I either lived in the city proper or in a community within 150 miles. Our family were life-long Chicago Bear fans, and my hubby and I and our kids lived in a suburb of Chicago that was only a few miles from Naperville, the headquarters of this fictional pro team. Back in the 50's and 60's there were indeed two professional football teams in Chicago--the Bears and the Chicago Cardinals. (The Cardinals now play in Arizona.) So imagining another pro team in Chicago wasn't all that difficult. I found this book to be extremely interesting in that it was a very accurate look-see into the inner workings of a pro team and some of the pressures that can cause some fairly overwhelming conflict between the players, coaches, and management.

This book is also about the issue of deciding who someone really is based on externals. Phoebe made some judgment calls about Dan that were very much in error. She was unaware that he was tired to the bone of all the glitz and glamour that had been a part of his life during his playing days and now as a head coach. Phoebe didn't know that he was looking for a wife--a woman who wanted a home and family, who loved him for himself and not for his image, fame, or money. In fact, he was courting an elementary school teacher who was quiet, loved kids, and pretty, but even though he was drawn to her, he couldn't get Phoebe out of his brain or stop responding to an attraction that just didn't seem to lessen. Dan was also challenged to discover that a blonde bimbo-type woman could actually teach him something about people, lessons that could help him build the team he so desperately wanted and a winning one at that.

Dan saw Phoebe's history as a jet-setting, New York loving, art-loving twit, a woman who had been in relationships with world-class artists and whose portraits (nude) were hanging in museums all over the world. He didn't know she was a scared little girl who had hungered for stability and love all her life, who wanted someone to see her and love her when she wasn't made up to the last eyelash or wearing her gold lame dresses. She wanted a man who recognized that she had a brain (and a very good one, at that) and who could hold her own among the powerful men who thought she was just a useless piece of feminine fluff.

There is a lot of humor in this story, a lot of deep thinking to be done by all the characters, a sense that there are a number of characters in this story besides Phoebe and Dan who need to discover their own place in the scheme of life and to celebrate who they really are. And as we are approaching Super Bowl Sunday, it seemed appropriate to consider that often the difference between a winning team and one that just doesn't quite make it, or one that skids all the way to the bottom of the standings--all of whom have really good players--can be the attitudes of their coaches, their ability to relax and use their talents, and the confidence the management has in their skills.

This book has been around for 17 years, yet it's remarkably contemporary and one that I found to be so much fun to read. I even read some portions to my football fan[atic] hubby. Lots of fun, some sad times and some not-so-nice people, renewed family ties, and the discovery that love can come wrapped in some surprising packages. If you haven't read this series, you owe it to yourself to do so. I give this novel a rating of 4.25 out of 5.