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Thursday, October 18, 2012

Throwback Thursday: One Touch of Topaz & Tender Savage by Iris Johansen

 These two books are loosely related. While second one has a character from the first book, I think they could both be read as stand alone books.

The first in the older series is One Touch of Topaz (Loveswept, July 1988).  I'm not sure I liked this one all that much.  I didn't care for Samantha (Topaz). She was just too self sacrificing for me.  I'm not sure that a 15YO who witnessed the murder of her father and who had fought in a revolution for so long would be wiling to give up so much of herself for the sake of others.  It kind of got annoying after a while. 

I liked Fletcher a lot more.  He is an honorable man and can clearly see that Samantha needs to be rescued.  He fights his pull to her for so long only to realize her can't live without her.  I was happy to see that Samantha realizes in the end that she can deserves to be happy and is able to reach for what she wants.

Tender Savage (Loveswept, September 1990) was a better book.  I liked it a lot more than the first book.   Laura was a great character.  She was a strong person and had a lot of guts.  Any woman who is willing to go through what she did just to rescue a man from imprisonment would have to be,.  I thought the characters were a bit more realistic and more mature. 

Laura and Ricardo have a great chemistry together.  I was so frustrated with Ricardo and his insistence that he couldn't be president of his country and have happiness as well.  I was rooting for their HEA.

I listened to the audio  versions of both books.  They were well done and I was able to listen to both in an afternoon.  If you have to pick on over the other, I recommend Tender Savage.

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