Customer Reviews

The Mirrabrook Marriage (Romance)

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1 star:		(1)

 

 

Third and final book in the Southern Cross Ranch Series - The Cattleman's English Rose, The Blind Date Surprise, & The Mirrabrook Marriage.

Description from the book back cover:

Sarah Rossiter has been in love with rugged cattle station owner Reid McKinnon for years. They'd been happy together until Reid suddenly broke things off - leaving Sarah puzzled and heartbroken. In fact, Reid had discovered something that made him swear never to be a husband or father. Now, when Sarah decides - reluctantly - to start a new life away from Star Valley, Reid knows he must act or risk losing her forever. But will she still be willing to marry him once she knows the dark secrets his family has hidden ...?

'Southern Cross Ranch' - Family secrets, Outback marriages!
Deep in the heart of the Outback, nestled in Star Valley, is the McKinnon family cattle station. Southern Cross Station is an oasis in the harsh Outback landscape and a refuge to the McKinnon family - Kane, Annie, and Reid. But it's also full of secrets ...

The Mirrabrook Marriage by Barbara Hannay
Harlequin Romance # 3849 - June 2005
Book # 3 - Southern Cross Ranch

For years Sarah's been in love with Reid. They met when she was attending University and she took the job of school teacher in the outback town with the expectations of a future with him. All was going well, and Reid was going to ask her to marry him, he had the ring. Reid's father took ill suddenly, and dies before he could tell Reid his deepest secret. When Reid learns the dark secret from his mother, he's devastated. He can't marry Sarah. He can't ever allow himself to be a father. He'd only taint anyone who loved him. So he broke up their relationship without an explanation. Years pass. Sarah deep inside feels Reid still loves her and that causes her to remain in her job. She sees the yearning and the desire in his eyes. As Reid's brother returns home with his new wife and Annie prepares for her wedding, Sarah is caught up once again in Reid's life. Annie's paired Reid and Sarah together in the wedding party. This is sweet torture and they find their passions ignite once more. Only Reid is even more determined to push Sarah away. It's only when Sarah commits herself to moving away for good, that Reid must face his decisions.

This is by far the best of the three. This is a powerful story of a tortured man. In living his own pain, he can't grasp that Sarah's love is something that can lift his burdens. I was surprised with the revelations at the end. A very good read!

Southern Cross Ranch series
The Cattleman's English Rose ~ HR-3841 ~ April 2005
The Blind Date Surprise ~ HR-3845 ~ May 2005
The Mirrabrook Marriage ~ HR-3849 ~ June 2005

This was a very good book. The secret that the hero was keeping that tore the couple apart was actually realistic for a Harlequin. The circumstances of the secret were a little far-fetched though. And, the heroine was realistic. She tried to hang in there for her man but recognized when to cut her losses.

One complaint- the couple never talked through their issues- but this is typical in a Harlequin. But, might I add, in this book, the secret was one that really might have traumatized someon in reality so it is pretty realistic that he did not share this with the heroine.

The characters were likeable and you were not over saturated with appearances by the characters from the first two books.

Sex was present but not overwhelmingly so- after all this is a Harlequin Romance. But this was a pleasant break from the other HR books where the couple barely kisses.

This author knows how to tell a good story and this was the best book of the trilogy.

All in all this was a very good book.

I generally like Barbara Hannay's books. She writes sweet Australian outback romances. They have a tendency to be filled with babies and small children, but I just skip over the books with the pregnant women and the twins on the covers.

I wasn't liking this one much from early on, with the flimsiest excuse for a problem in the couple's relationship I have ever read.

But then I got to the ten page epilogue. There are SIX children in the epilogue, with talk of more. The children are nasty little brats who aren't disciplined because in Romancelandia a naughty child is `adorable'. And Hannay goes out of her way to let us know the heroine - a heroine who was proud of and defined by her career - has given everything up to stay home and be a broodmare for no particular reason. I have no problem with stay at home mums, but the agenda the author was pushing here upset me. It was just a horrible, disgusting way to end the book.

The reason the couple aren't together for six years? Because the hero is worried he has bad blood, as in a father who wasn't a good person. And - because this is a Barbara Hannay book - the world will end if the heroine doesn't have a hundred children, and the hero doesn't want to give her his evil seed (yes, he actually thinks something like this).

When the heroine is upset the hero won't be with her, she writes to an Agony Aunt column - a column she writes. The whole town knows she wrote that letter, and the heroine is fine with that? Nothing these characters did seemed realistic. The characters weren't behaving like real people do.

And, sensitive heroes are fine, but this guy seemed to be crying in two out of every three scenes!

This book was ridiculous and insulting, very backwards, and made the characters look like complete idiots.

I'm going to have to be more careful before reading anything more from this writer.