Natural Born Charmer by Susan Elizabeth Phillips Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Natural Born Charmer
Book Review: One of Her Best...
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm a big SEP fan and I think this is one of her best. She is at the top of her game with her razor sharp wit and strong secondary characters.
Blue is down on her luck in Colorado, but along comes a great lookin' guy in a great car and pulls her from the edge. Blue and Dean get to know each other (intellectually, not sexually) on a road trip to Tennessee and the sparks begin to fly. There are complications at his newly-acquired Tennessee farm, but Blue stays around to help him through it (and keep a roof over her head). As the relationship develops, Blue understands the need to change the balance of power in the relationship - he has all of it - and she steps back from him and away from his farm. Smart move....Dean begins pursuing her and the relationship deepens. There are some bumps along the way - both carry serious baggage from much-to-be-desired childhoods, but the end is satisfying.
There's also a good secondary story with Dean's never-been-married-to-each-other parents. If you like a good contemporary romantic comedy, this one is among the best.
Book Review: One of my fav contemporaries.
Summary: 5 Stars
My chief problem with this hilarious, smart & sassy story is the fact that the HEA (happily ever after, usually pronounced "HEE-uh") comes together too quickly. I feel that so much page-time is spent on the subplots with Dean's parents and his baby half-sister, that we don't get nearly enough time with Blue and Dean themselves, so when everything works out for them, it just snaps into place. After a few hundred pages of excellent conflict and build up, I was disappointed that they basically got a wand-wave to fix their issues. Also, Dean needed to grovel more for a particular mistake.
Gotta say, I really love these MC's. Blue is perhaps my favorite Phillips heroine ever, because she's witty and independent, but never annoying, like those heroines who say they can take care of themselves but really can't. She's a self-starter and is so unpredictable, Dean can barely keep up with what she'll do next. I even love her decription--she's an artistic personality who wears hideous baggy clothes she finds in Lost and Found bins, but she also has babydoll eyes, "the color of grape lollipops," which is such a cute detail. I picture Zooey Deschanel when I read about Blue, or maybe a brunette Reese Witherspoon. Blue is quick-witted and snarky, and it's clear that nobody else could match Dean or shake him out of his apathy, because if Blue is too much of a caustic loner, Dean is too much of a team player. He's constantly having to shake hands, make small talk, sign autographs, hug, flirt, etc. 24/7, to the extent that most people think his charming public persona is his only persona. But he's far from empty-headed and has his own acerbic wit when the situation calls for it.
A few other things I love: as a rich athlete, Dean's never really had to pursue a relationship--they've always just happened for him, with little or no effort on his part. When things get complicated between him and Blue, Dean rather hilariously has no idea what to say or how to show Blue that she's important to him, and Captain Suave starts acting mighty clumsy. Then there's the nice small town setting of the story, the fact that the MC's have matching sets of trust and abandonment issues to work through, the laugh-out-loud moments...if there are any other downsides, it's that Phillips' writing tends to describe everyone's clothing in explicit detail every time they appear, and I just don't want that much detail. Also, after reading ten of her books, I think the heroes do occasionally think in non-guy-like ways (usually related to the aforementioned fashion obsession--the guy will be looking at his honey, and notice that she's wearing pumps/mules/wedge heels/slingbacks...how many average men would be able to register the difference?) but not so much that it's usually noticeable.
Natural Born Charmer is definitely charming, and for a good introduction to Phillips, I'd recommend picking up this novel, or the one just before it, Match Me if You Can.
Book Review: Perfect romance novel
Summary: 4 Stars
This is the best romance novel i have read in a long time. It was long, yet kept me engaged to the last page. The characters were amazingly well developed. They had clear motivations, their actions were believable. It was a charming wonderful read.Book Review: SEP hits the mark once again
Summary: 5 Stars
Like another reviewer, I'm a huge SEP fan and will buy her books without question the moment I see them on the shelves. As usual, with snappy dialogue, humor & insight she hits the mark with Blue & Dean. And it's nice to see a quirky, unusual heroine - something else SEP tends to specialize in. Not a drop-dead beauty that most of us cannot relate to.
I also liked the 2nd romance (SEP always has a secondary romance that seems to start at the mid-way point of the book) between April & Jack. The relationship between the fading rock star & the former groupie has some nice bittersweet ache to it, without being sloppy-sentimental. I know publishers would never invest in a relationship between two "mature" people with a past history as a stand-alone novel, so it's nice to read this strong secondary story mixed in with the story of the main couple.
Book Review: Thought she was going to break from her pattern
Summary: 1 Stars
But she didn't.
This is the first novel of SEP where I thought maybe the guy would fall in love first.
But OF COURSE NOT. It's the girl who has to have the hopeless love first. Then he graciously manages to fall in love with her, and it doesn't ring true.
The pattern she writes is over and over the same thing: plainish girl (pretty but no knock out) meets big celebrity guy who can have any woman he wants. She falls in love with him and realizes she can't have him, because, of course, he can have any woman and won't settle for just her.
Then miraculously he decides he loves her in the last couple of chapters.