Customer Reviews

Blue Dahlia (In the Garden, Book 1)

5 star:		(65)
4 star:		(38)
3 star:		(25)
2 star:		(13)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

Ms. Roberts is off to a great start with her latest "Garden Series" with the first of the books being "Blue Dahlia". This read offers the fan of the paranormal romance genre everything that Ms. Roberts is known for. Tears, Laughter, and a great cast of characters that tell their own story. Major and secondary characters are all important to the telling of this story and are not used as filler.

Sella Rothchild thinks that she has lost everything when her husband dies and leaves her a widow with two small boys to raise. What she needs is a change. A change comes with the chance of moving back to southern Tennessee in order to manage a plant nursery. She is going to work for Roz Harper and help her organize her already successful operation. One catch, she must live at Harper House, a wonderful old plantation manor that just so happens to have it's very own resident ghost. Oh, and one member of the staff does not want to be organized. This of course would Logan Kiteridge. Could a man be more madding???

It's not long before Stella is butting heads with garden designer Logan Kitridge and the sparks that fly from the first meeting only get brighter with each meeting there after. Soon Stella is florishing in her new situation, and she is even allowing her heart to open again to a new man, but someone on the plantation is not happy about it. Does Logan and Stella have half a chance at finding happiness that they both want, or will someone ruin their relationship before it even gets off the ground?

This was a fast-paced read that had this reader glued to the pages until the very end. Stella and Logan are a great couple, and the sparks they set off each other are fun to read about. As per normal when reading a Nora Robert book you will find both laughter and tears which is probably why she is a NY Times Bestselling author. I highly recommend this read and I look forward to the next in the series.

Official Reviewer for www.romancedesigns.com

Stella Rothchild widowed at a young age with two boys to raise, uproots her life and moves to Tennessee to take a job managing a thriving nursery. Almost immediately, she feels at home at the home her employer Roz Harper provides her and her sons. As they bring in another lost soul Hayley into the fold, Stella feels a bond with the other two women, and feels like she belongs at Harper House, and couldn't be happier about her decision to move.

When she meets landscape designer Logan Kitridge, sparks ignite, and as Stella finds herself drawn to Logan, things start to happen that she can't understand. It appears that the ghost living within the confines of Harper House doesn't like Stella and Logan exploring a relationship. While everyone admits to the ghost always being a presence, they have never suffered the ire that the ghost directs toward Stella.

This is a very well written mystery, and the characters are wonderful. While we are introduced to the key six main characters, the supporting characters like David are priceless. Only pieces of the story of the Harper bride are disclosed, and the rest of the story promises to be exciting.

Stella Rothschild's husband suddenly dies and she is left alone with two young sons. Devastated and afraid, Sarah grieves but eventually turns her attention toward the future. She moves from Michigan to start all over again in Memphis, the place where she was born and her father now lives. There she gets a job as a manager of a nursery/garden shop. She quickly becomes friends with Roz, the enigmatic owner of the shop, her new boss and owner of Harper house where Stella lives as a condition of her employment.. She also becomes friend with Hayley, a somehow cousin of Roz's who shows up pregnant on Roz's doorstep. The three women bond, Stella embarks on a romance with a landscaper and there is a ghost haunting the place.

You can always count on Nora Roberts putting out one of her JD Robb titles(Visions in Death), a single title (Northern Lights) and trilogy title at least once a year and usually around the same time. I used to be thrilled about this because there is no bigger bummer than a favorite author not being prolific enough to satisfy your need to read their new book(George R.R. Martin, I am speaking to you!). But this time around I am not as satisfied with the results that I normally am. I think "flat" is a very good adjective to describe this book. Stella, Roz, Logan, Hayley even the ghost are all such `meh' creatures that the I had a very hard time getting involved or excited about any of them. The romance between Stella and Logan wasn't very exciting and I can't even get worked up to anticipate the two follow ups. This is a major change from her most recent "Key" trilogy where each book was a page turner and I couldn't wait to see how the story ended. This one, I could barely get to the end of the first book.

Seems that I agree with many of the other reviewers here... this latest effort by Nora Roberts is just a little flat compared to many of her previous works.

The basic story is about widowed mother of two, Stella Rothchild. Stella is a nut about organization. She then falls for Logan Kitridge, the scatterbrained landscaper. In the story you also meet Roz and Hayley, heroines of the next two books in the trilogy, and the Harper Bride, resident ghost.

I'm hoping the other books will be more interesting, as I found Roz and Hayley to both be more fascinating than Stella. Stella was kind of boring, unfortunately. Also, I think too much of the story focused on other people and on the ghost, not enough on Logan and Stella. Their relationship seemed rather rushed and almost unrealistic.

Also, the gardening aspect was just plain boring. Maybe it's because I have no interest in gardening myself... but one of the things I always liked about Nora Roberts was the interesting jobs her characters had (treasure hunters, stage magicians, talk show hosts, writers, etc). Gardening isn't quite as fun to read about as a couple who fall in love while searching the ocean for buried treasure.

To be fair, Nora Roberts at mediocre is still YARDS better than most other writers at their best. I finished the book in a matter of hours and while it was not as good as some of her other stuff, it was still interesting enough to keep me reading. If I get bored with a book, I'll toss it aside and not bother finishing it. So, she gets 3 stars from me and I will be spending the money to read the other two books in the series. :)

I hate starting a book and not finishing it. But I am having a hard time sticking with this one. I love Nora and don't really give her a bad review but this book is killing me.

First of all, no one writes location like Nora. But this one, ugh, boring. The local is outside of Memphis, Tennessee. Not even in Memphis but somewhere within driving distance of it. And that's about as descriptive as the location gets, aside from a boring trip to Graceland and dinner on Beale Street.

The romance between Stella and Logan is so dry and lacking of any chemistry. Logan is not appealing at all. Kind of reminds me of the leading men in Sandra Brown's novels, just basically a jerk with a bad attitude.

I just don't find myself caring about any of these people. They are all so flat. As for the ghost, well, the same goes for the ghost, I just don't care, it's boring. And this is the first in the trilogy! I can't see myself reading the next two to follow.

As I said, I love Nora Roberts, and this is the first book of hers I have read that I have really disliked. But she is a great writer. If you're new to her pick up the Three Sisters trilogy, The Chesapeake Bay trilogy, or the Irish trilogy, they are much much better.

In Southfield, Michigan Stella Rothchild is making dinner when strangers arrived to tell her that her beloved husband Kevin died in a freak accident. Stunned, not long afterward, she leaves Michigan with her two young children for Memphis to get away from the memories.

Two and a half years later in Memphis, Stella has become manager of a nursery on the grounds of the Harper Mansion. Owner Rosalind Harper persuades Stella to move into the large house with her two boys. The work is fine and Stella enjoys her spirited battles with landscaper Logan Kitridge, which slowly brings her back to life. As they begin to fall in love, the angry lunatic ghost The Harper Bride haunts the mansion as she has for over a century seeking children especially infants. Stella wants to know why in order to protect her offspring, but the truth goes back to 1892 to one of Roz's ancestors and his mistress.

BLUE DAHLIA, the opening of Nora Roberts' paranormal trilogy is an exhilarating ghost story that grips the audience throughout the tale. Though Ms. Roberts writes more novels than rabbits breed, somehow she always makes her cast seem genuine regardless of the milieu she places them in. This tale is no different as the audience will appreciate the powerful secondary cast that for the most part reside at the Mansion; accept the realistic changes in Stella that keep the tale focused, and enable the audience to believe in ghosts.

Harriet Klausner

Devolution
While I have always been an avid fan of Nora Roberts, almost compulsively so, I have found myself of late growing weary and and disappointed. Nora, the queen of characterizations, has reached the end of her archetypes. From the first introduction of Stella, a seasoned NR reader can easily predict with whom she will be paired, befriend and the demons to be fought. Roz and Logan and Harper have appeared before, each with her or his 'clever' thoughts and glib language and inevitable reactions. Nora's writing has grown lazy, with each character sharing the same pedestrian voice, and without context, each is nearly indistinguishable from the other. I long for the days of Honest Illusions and the McKade brothers, when I was surprised by the genre and amazed by Nora's ability to defy the cliches of romantic traditions. When will we see her kind again?

I enjoyed this book very much and looks forward to the next one coming out soon. This book has disappointed some people and I can see why -- it is slower-paced and less "zesty" or "sparkly" as most of NR's books are. I believe that is due more because of the situation for Stella in this book. A young mother in the prologue whose young husband dies tragically in a commuter plane accident. Her life has been so abruptly sent in another direction that I believe that NR's sympathies are with her and her boys and that she is thus approaching this on a softer and quieter level that may be somewhat boring for some readers. I am a mom of 6 and loved this new side of Nora.

I enjoyed the interaction of the three women, Roz, Stella and Hayley, the gruff by warm-hearted characterization of Logan and the start of the characterizations of Roz's oldest son, Harper, and the college professor, Mitch.

The ghost and the accompanying mystery to the characters (but not to the readers so much) is sure to be a continual denouement that I look forward to reading.

If you enjoy and gentle story, I recommend this!

I think I'm finally finished with reading Nora Roberts; this book put me over the edge. I was looking forward to Blue Dahlia for months and when I finally started reading it I got to about the 4th chapter before I put it down and didn't pick it up for another 2 weeks. And usually I fly through her books in a day or two. Here's why I couldn't stand it:

1. Logan's an idiot. I'm so sick of authors making their hero a complete jerk and for some reason thinking readers will think it's sexy and romantic. 'He yanked her hair and crushed his lips to hers.' Come on! But, lo and behold, the heroine falls for him hard which means...

2. The herione's an idiot.

3. I'm sick of stupid metaphors. I'm just making one up here but like when Stella's talking about her kids to Logan he'll say something like, "You watered your garden with love and now it's growing." Ok, A) men don't say stuff like that and B) lines like that make my eyes almost roll to the back of my head, they're so lame.

4. Sorry to all you gardeners but a book about gardening is about as exciting as a book about rocks. (sorry to all you rock enthusiasts) The pages just go on and on and on and on and on about flowers and planting and selling flowers and how beautiful gardens are. BAHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Knock me out, PLEASE!

5. Only kids and pregnant women can see this ghost? Yet Stella keeps getting glimpses of her? Okaaaaaaaay...

So that's why I couldn't stand this book. Nora Roberts needs to retire now.

If you're reading this please don't think that the talented romance author Nora Roberts disappeared, or, I shudder at the word, retired, and is now making her comeback. No, rather that she is back after writing less than ehr usual books in my opinion. Series which included Jewels of the Sea, the Three Sister Island and the Key books in my opinion just weren't up to Ms. Robert's usual wonderful tales or characters found in her other trilogies. But my opinion of her newest book is that Nora is back and better than ever. The first book in the In the Garden trilogy, Blue Dahlia is Nora at her best and I couldn't be happier that I did read this book.

To a grand home in Tennessee, which is also a business known as In the Garden, comes Stella and her two young sons. Still reeling from the loss of her husband sometime before, Stella decides that a return to her roots from Michigan and living closer to her father is just what her small family needs. But what she never expected was to be so warmly taken in by her employer Roz Harper, a fiercely independent and shrewd businesswoman. Stella proves to be an able bodied manager of Roz's business while her children adjust quickly to a househod which seems to delight in their presence. And for Stella the attention paid by a tempermental landscaper is just the tease she needs to get back into the world of dating. Then a young pregnant woman arrives on Roz's doorstep claiming to be a distant cousin of Roz's and she is also included in the circle of these two women.

Mixing in a legend and a hovering ghost along with a wonderful love story for Stella, I found this to be one of Nora's best books in recent years. I highly recommend it and now look forward to reading the next book in this series as soon as it is available at the bookstores.