Saturday, December 13, 2008

A Virgin River Christmas by Robyn Carr ***

This is the 4th in the Virgin River series, and it introduces 2 completely new characters (unless they were mentioned in the 3rd one and I don't remember) - Ian Buchanan and Marcie Sullivan.

Ian is a former Marine who is now a hermit in the mountains near Virgin River, and Marcie is the widow of a Marine who served under Ian in Iraq. In fact, Ian was the one who saved Bobby when he was hit - but Bobby never recovered, and spent a few years unresponsive and comatose before passing. Ian had only visited one time - and apparently his emotional scars from Iraq were enough that he left the Marines and went into hiding. Marcie has spent several months looking for him, determined to let him know about Bobby's death and also how much Bobby had looked up to him.

When she finally finds him, he tries to chase her away, but she's stubborn and determined and will not be run off. However, she's picked up the flu, and he ends up having to nurse her in his hermit cabin for a week while she recovers. She chips away at him slowly, getting him to come out of his shell, and eventually a relationship develops.

It's a nice story and I enjoyed it, but somehow the magic of the 1st book in the series was never recreated in the subsequent sequels, so it never rose above a 3 "liked it" for me.

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