Customer Reviews

Desert Rain

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

I love Lowell's 'Donovan' and 'Rarieties' series and am starting to read her backlist. Well, if this is and example of the 'romance' of the eighties I know why I only started reading it about a year ago. The 'hero' is utterly unbearable, and the heroin's ability to accept verbal abuse is pathological! He considers her a whore from bhe beginning to the end, and she not only forgives him, but justifies his attitude. Honestly, after the first 50 or so pages I started skimming - it was just too dumb for words. Save your money

This is a review of the audio CD version. Let's first address what is wrong with the recording. Laural Merlington has such a lovely and expressive voice and easily differentiates the characters, but why oh why is Holly made to sound like the nine year old who first fell in love with Linc? Eeeew! I'm sure she could easily have made just a slightly plainer voice than Shannon's for Holly and the CD would have been 1000% better. As it is, the baby-doll voice given to Holly is just horrible to listen to. Horrible and disturbing at the same time. It sounds like they wanted to so change the voices that Shannon and Holly could be confused aurally - just like Linc is visually blinded by simple makeup. Guess what? That ploy doesn't work. It doesn't work in spades.

What about the book itself? It seems to me once Linc told the worldly ( yet still very chaste ) Holly that Shannon and everyone like her were prostitutes she should have slapped the snot out of him and gotten out of this book pronto. Holly could than have thanked her lucky stars that she got away from such an out and out creep and then she could have used the rest of the book to meditate that schoolgirl crushes at age nine NEVER WORK OUT.

She then could have met a handsome town vet and ( because of their mutual interest in horses ), and she could have been wooed and wedded by him instead of you-know-who.

All this AND Linc saw her as a woman at 14? Eeeew again! Double Eeeew! And he tells her so? Triple Eeeew!

In real life, this guy should have been in jail long before Holly ever came back to town.

I have read a few of Lowell's book, but this one is one of the worst. Holly Shannon North is one of the most shameless female characters from all the romance novels I have read.

Lincoln McKenzie has his heart broken before by a beautiful woman that explains his aversion to them (yeah, right). These 2 characters knew each other since childhood and Holly left to pursue a modeling career under the name of Shannon.

Now bear this in mind, once Shannon takes off her make-up. Linc can't even recognize her. This is the most absurd storyline I have ever seen.

So now, Linc has to decide whether or not he could see Holly for who she is and not a beautiful woman. Among all the books I have read, I never really despise any of the lead character but this book is a winner. Holly/Shannon will go on bragging about her beauty (if wearing make-up makes you beautiful, so is half of the female population). And this sentence from the book will forever stick to my mind.
`Oh, Linc you don't know how beautiful I can be.'
Now that is someone who does not believe in modesty or shame.

A cliched insult to reader's intelligence. Some fancy clothes and makeup and he can't recognize the woman's he's just slept with? He hates her when she's beautiful becuase beautiful woman are mean. Right. And she chases after this? Terrible. read almost anything else by Lowell. Try a Donovan for starters.

I liked all of the Elizabeth Lowell books I had read up until this one. Sorry, but it's really bad. Some of the lines are so bad that I blinked and read them again just to make sure it said what I thought it said. The hero(?) hates beautiful models; so, of course, the heroine(?) is a beautiful model--except when she takes her makeup off. Then she is so plain that he doesn't recognize her and is able to love her. I might have liked her if she hadn't kept bragging on her own beauty. Read it, if you don't believe me, but don't say I didn't warn you.

Holly Shannon North grew up in California, but when her parents died when she was sixteen, she was taken to New York by her aunt, leaving her one and only love behind: Lincoln McKenzie. When she comes back, she's in her twenties and a world famous model. She comes back to the land and the man she loves, but he has some old scars that had never healed. They were all caused by a beautiful woman, so he has some natural prejudices. Holly then decides to hide the fact that she's a model. When Linc sees her again, he sees her as his sweet Holly, not as the internationally famous model Shannon. Desert Rain is an account of how Holly tries to curb his prejudices, and heal his wounds. Once again, Elizabeth Lowell has created a masterpiece. Well done!

I think Elizabeth Lowell is a good writer and this story was well written. However, I don't think any woman would put up with Linc, a self-professed hater of "Beautiful Women". When Holly makes a tranformation into the model "Shannon", Linc decides she is a whore and spends the rest of the book treating her like one. She should have punched him in the eye and left him to wallow.

She still has it. I really liked this book it was a good as the rest.

Hate you because your beautiful.Run don't walk from this type of guy
Read this book and witness "love makes you stupid"
Girl loves boy, boy lust girl, boy abuses girl, boy rapes girl, girls tolerates boy because he apologizes, boy demands she change, boy refuses to change, girl finally leaves after degrading herself, boy& girl live happily ever after. Linc (the boy) is a total sexist butt.
Run the other way Holly.
Worse romance ever except for Princess Di & Charles

I read the back of the book and was curious how she would play it off. I'm not sure I think she did. The split personality routine that Linc pulled left much to be desired. I can see how being hurt by a beautiful woman would sour him but the way he took his problems out on Holly didn't hit me the right way. I mean one minute he was being mister wonderful and the perfect mate then the next he was the coldhearted jerk that almost raped the woman he claimed to love. I would have seriously hated this book if weren't for the end. The way the author had him beg, not enough but beg none the less, to be allowed back into Holly's life almost made up for the way he treated her.Almost...