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Tangled Memories

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I recently got the chance to read Tangled Memories by Jan Scarbrough. Set in modern time, it's a marriage-of-convenience tale, but with a twist.

Fate. Karma. Kismet. Call it what you want, but in the end, it's about two souls combined...that's why they are soul mates.

Tangled Memories find Mary Adams reluctantly wed to Dr. Alexander Dominican under the pretense of killing two birds with one stone. The tragic death of Mary's husband has left her deeply in debt thanks to his gambling addiction. Alex needs a mother for his infant daughter, whose own mother died shortly after childbirth from cancer.

Alex's proposal of marriage, nothing more than a business deal, seems the perfect answer to both their problems. Alex is content in the knowledge he's given his child a mother, and in some respects, the mother he never had, all the while Mary is given a second chance at being a mother herself, after having a miscarriage in her youth that prevented her from having children of her own. It's a void she has felt deeply in the years since.

Nothing could have prepared Mary for the firestorm of vivid dreams and visions she would be subjected to upon marrying Alex. The sudden uncharacteristic attraction to him leaves her weak-kneed, yet lonely for a husband who truly loves and desires her. Her fears and anxiety bubble to the surface in her new home, a Gothic medieval museum to the past, made to seem even more so with the looming suits of armor, the dark rich tapestries, the hateful housekeeper, the mute servant Rufus and an invalid father tucked away in the shadows. It couldn't get anymore Gothic than that.

Each time the overwhelming hallucinations propel her back in time, she becomes an invisible observer of another woman's life. A young girl whose life seems to parallel Mary's in ways that even she can't begin to fathom and awakens a desire to have a true, real marriage rather than the farce she and Alex have committed themselves to.

As the visions grow in intensity, so does the malicious attacks on her sanity. Someone is destroying her belongings, threatening her to leave, and even putting Alex's young daughter's life in danger. When Alex brushes off her concerns and her suspicions of his trusted servants, Mary has nowhere to turn.

A bond keeps drawing her and Alex back to each other, keeping her there when everything else tells her she should go. Could he grow to love her? There were moments when she thought so, moments when she pondered that they were the couple in the past, the ones in her dreams.

How could that be? It was crazy and she wouldn't dare breathe a word of it to Alex or he'd have her tucked away in a padded cell somewhere or doped up on pills to keep her crazies at bay.

Nevertheless, just suppose for a moment that Love IS eternal...that it transcends time and lasts forever...that two souls, who've loved once and deeply, will continue to journey through the fabric of time to find each other...to love each other again and again, because I'd like to believe that...I'd like to believe that "love never dies."

And if that's so--wouldn't you do anything you could to make certain you found it, held onto it and cherished for as long as this lifetime would allow you?

I hope I've given this book a just appraisal and I have a feeling I'll be reading it again before I know it. It's definitely a keeper for me.

Reviewed By~Robin

Review Copy Provided By~Publisher

Ms. Scarbrough writes a lovely tale of reincarnation. If you weren't a believer before reading this story you just make think twice about it after this story.

In writing this story at times I felt as if I could actually feel and smell the things that were happening as the descriptions were very vivid. Each time Ms. Scarbrough took us back to the 14th Century and back again it was if you were right there with the characters.

The characters were very alive; their emotions were so real and raw that I found it easy to get caught up in their story.

The crossover from the past to the present was also very believable.

Right away it is easy to fall for Mary plight. Having just lost her husband she is being eaten alive with his debt from gambling. Mary had a miscarriage which left her unable to have children and left her with a void she couldn't fill.

Alex, Dr. Alexander Dominican just lost his wife shortly after she gave birth to their daughter to cancer.

Mary needs money to survive and Alex needs someone to be a mother to his daughter. Can a marriage born from need grow into something more?

Two desperate souls destined for each other through time as they are always brought back to one another.

Once they are married Alex finds that Mary is the best mother he could have hoped for and maybe just a little he wishes he could have had a mother like her.

As their marriage starts Mary starts having these vivid dreams and visions. She finds that she is strongly attracted to Alex in these dreams and visions and they leave her wanting him. She longs for the love that she shared with her husband.

Mary finds herself anxious at times and who wouldn't be. The home is very gothic, like a medieval museum to the past. It has all those dark tapestries, complete with suits of amour. If that wasn't enough to scare someone add in a housekeeper that is hateful, a servant that is mute and an invalid father that is tucked away.

Every time that Mary is taken back into time she feels as if she is observing someone else's life but she soon realizes it is her own life that she is actually watching. Things parallel her life and the more she goes back the more she is awakened and wanting a real marriage and not just a platonic one.

She soon begins having attacks on her sanity. These attacks are real, her things are beginning to be destroyed. As this takes a toll on Mary she threatens to leave but, this only puts Alex's daughter in danger. Alex doesn't believe Mary she has nowhere to turn.

Because of the bond between the two of them Mary chooses to stay. As she begins to believe that the bond between them transcends time and that they are the couple from her visions.

Ms. Scarbrough weaves a very spellbinding tale that keeps you riveted to your seat, turning those pages to find out if Mary and Alex can survive the test of time and fall in love all over again. I loved how she grabs you and keeps you very entertained. A story that spans many genres for the reader in everyone.

I just finished reading Tangled Memories. It was so masterfully written and able to spellbound me immediately with the story of two soulmates, trying to make sense of their lives together. The author moves us between centuries with ease and captures our desire to know the entire story. Read the book. You will not regret it!!!

I never read contemporary romance. But I had two good reasons to try this one. First, I LOVED Jan Scarbrough's first historical novel My Lord Raven and second - Tangled Memories promised a Gothic undertone and flashbacks to the fourteenth century. Truth be told, I don't regret it! But frankly I never thought I would be blown away by it!

I often complain about the lack of atmosphere in a book but here it was as tangible as you could want. You can feel it, you can even smell it, you are surrounded by it.

The author has definitely succeeded in creating a true atmosphere mixed with an incredible range of emotions. You cannot help but be touched and moved by it.

The two main characters are perfect in their interaction, so believable, so genuine. There is an invisible bond between Mary and Alex and even in her worst moments of doubts and questioning, she is irresistibly dragged back to him like a magnet.

You really want to believe in this everlasting love, you need it ... and at the end you cannot stop yourself from believing!

Without a doubt I recommend it. For myself I can't wait for her next historical novel.

This story grabs hold of you and does not let go until the VERY surprising end! Jan Scarbrough's characters are wonderful, and the reincarnation facet intriguing. If you are a fan of Jude Deveraux's A KNIGHT IN SHINING ARMOR, give TANGLED MEMORIES a try.

Romantic Times Review -- 4 STARS

I am thrilled to see a revival of the gothic romance. Not only does it have effective gothic elements but also flashbacks to the earlier time made it seem as if I were reading two different stories that paralleled each other. Kathy Boswell