Customer Reviews

Spanish Eyes (Five Star Expressions)

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Legal immigrant Elena Castillo comes to Las Flores seeking her brother Carlos and their cousin Jorge Brazos, who legally cross the border to work on construction projects. The two men are out of town working at an isolated location. Las Flores College art teacher Oliver Avery notices Elena at the mall and suddenly believes in love at first site.

Carlos' pregnant wife Carlotta and his teenage younger brother Juan illegally cross the border from Mexico because she wants her child born in America. They obtain work at the Santa Maria de Las Flores mission. His siblings and wife remain ignorant to the fact that Carlos and Jorge are in danger from an unscrupulous contractor who will cheat the immigrant work force and kill those who threaten their enterprise. Elena trusts Oliver with what she knows happened to Carlos and Jorge, but though attracted to him fears the connection his best friend Matt has with the sheriff when it comes to her younger brother and sister-in-law.

SPANISH EYES paints a different picture of legal and illegal immigrants than is typically discussed in Congress at least on the fence side of the issue. Instead of terrorists committing crimes and stealing jobs, the illegals are described as abused and used. Although the villains (American contractors) have no redeeming qualities as they behave more like Dickensian capitalists taking advantage of no legal recourse for illegals and to a degree legals, readers will appreciate this entertaining romantic suspense in which most crossing the border seek economic freedom in spite of allegedly NAFTA sent the jobs to Mexico.

Harriet Klausner

I wanted to like this book. The plot is really fascinating, and could have made an even better story except for some things which made it hard for me to immerse myself in it. I did not like Oliver, one of the main characters who it seems you are supposed to empathize with and/or identify with. He is really jealous and irrational, which leaves me feeling he is controlling and somewhat unstable. His "love at first sight" of Elena does not come across as sweet to me, but almost creepy. I just don't buy the love story, because there is really no description of any actual connection or emotional development between Oliver and Elena, just his instantaneous infatuation with her based solely on her "Spanish Eyes." I also did not like the dialogue between Oliver and his friend Matt. I felt that the author was trying way too hard to use the lingo and banter that she believes two males in their 20s or 30s would use in their conversations. However, as a woman several decades removed from that generation, she misses the mark and Oliver and Matt's conversations come across as annoying and cliched. The villains of the story are portrayed cartoonishly in how one-dimensionally bad they are, you can almost imagine one of them letting out an evil "Mwhahh-ha-ha!" The ending is as completely tidy as you can imagine any fairy tale being, complete with a wedding happening within a few days of when the lovelorn Oliver proposes to the object of his obsession. In short, all of these overdone touches in the storytelling kept "Spanish Eyes" from feeling genuine or allowing you to truly identify with any of the characters, in spite of the potential inherent in the actual story.