PLOT SYNOPSIS:  Florida archaeologist Solange DuPree never expects to meet Mr. Right on a trip to Africa. Yet sensual, caring Rupert Giles is the real thing--but Solange knows that her devastating secret could destroy their future together.

REVIEW:  Unlike music artists who are able to take a couple of their best songs from each CD they have produced and make a compilation entitled “Best Hits,” writers cannot just pull a few pages from some of their most popular books and make a compilation of  their ‘best.’  Instead, writers must take the skills and fine-tuning what they have been afforded with each passing novel and package all of those skills together in their latest release.   With that thought in mind, FOR YOUR LOVE could very easily be categorized as ‘the best of Janice Sims’.  In FOR YOUR LOVE, Sims brings together all of the suspense, humor, compassion and passion that have come to make her a favorite amongst romance readers through the years.

A true sequel, FOR YOUR LOVE, picks up immediately where Sims’ 2001 release, A SECOND CHANCE AT LOVE, ended.  It was in A SECOND CHANCE AT LOVE, a novel that readers will most certainly want to read, that the hero and heroine of FOR YOUR LOVE initially met.  Strong, masculine and mysterious Rupert Giles had come to investigate a break-in at the University of Miami, where the voluptuous Dr. Solange Dupree works as an archaeology professor.

Already slightly familiar with each other, FOR YOUR LOVE begins with the handsome Rupert asking Solange to tour the city of Ethiopia with him, allowing the two of them to get to know each other better.   Though her field of study would be reason enough to stay in Ethiopia, Rupert’s kisses, sensual and light, tempts the independent woman to drop everything to be with him.  For as Solange herself described him, “If kissing were an art, then Rupert would be a master.”

Sims’ command of the written word shines brightly in FOR YOUR LOVE.  She shows her ability to transform a mundane task, like brushing and flossing teeth, into an intense sensual experience. This scene alone is guaranteed to have couples making sure dental floss is always in plenty supply.                                                                                                                       

Yet true to character, Sims does not build FOR YOUR LOVE on passion alone.  Readers are also allowed to see the role familial bonds play in shaping one’s psyche.  Readers will watch Solange and Rupert deal with the hurt they’d endured growing up with non-affectionate parents.  Readers will witness them learning and growing from their childhood experiences; experiences that help them to show compassion to some of the book’s well-depicted and strong secondary characters.

Using Ethiopia for the book's setting could have easily proven to be most disastrous for Ms. Sims.  However, the depiction of the country's rich history and culture is evidence that Ms. Sims has done her research.  This serves to enhance the novel’s overall appeal.

I highly recommend FOR YOUR LOVE, a novel that serves to remind me just why I fell in love with Sims’ literary creations to begin with and just why readers always make room in the ‘can’t bare to part with’ section of their personal libraries for Sims’ novels.

leslie@romanceincolor.net

JULY 2002