Charade
- Book Review,
by Sandra Brown
From Publishers Weekly
Soap opera star Cat Delaney gets a new heart--literally and figuratively speaking--in bestseller Brown's ( French Silk ; Where There's Smoke ) latest contemporary romance. The heart transplant that beautiful, arrogant Cat endures in the first chapter transforms her soul along with her cardiovascular system. If Brown had first established Cat's personality with some depth and credibility, that might have been the basis of an emotionally involving story. But since Cat is little more than a vessel for the concept, before we can blink, she is a good-hearted citizen who abandons stardom and Hollywood for San Antonio, Tex., where she hosts a local TV program featuring children up for adoption. Cat hardly has a chance to enjoy her change of heart and her new heartthrob, bad-boy crime novelist Alex Pierce, because a stalker is after her. Whatever suspense might have been activated by this scenario is immediately stymied as Brown rushes through events whereby three potential heart donors are knocked down like dominoes: obviously the stalker is a bereaved nut determined to kill all the transplant recipients who might have received his lover's heart. But Brown fails to develop even a modicum of tension, since the rushed pacing then slows to a crawl where nothing much happens except Cat's cliche-ridden romance with Alex. Too late in the novel, we finally get a more full and sympathetic characterization of Cat. Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club selections; major ad/promo; author tour. Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Cat Delaney has it all: beauty, a glamorous career, and a man who cares for her. Unfortunately, Cat also has a bad heart and needs a transplant. After receiving her new heart Cat decides to give up her career and her boyfriend to move to Texas and start a program to help find adoptive parents for foster kids. Her life is complicated by her jealous secretary and a new man in her life. In addition, she is being stalked by someone who is killing all the people who received a heart transplant on the same day she did. This is a tale with many twists, turns, and blind alleys. The plot is slow to develop, perhaps due to the introduction of so many characters at the story's onset. Though the ending is compelling, some may find boredom where they expected to find mystery and adventure. Constance Towers is an adequate reader but adds little to the tale's drama. As Brown is one of the hottest romantic suspense writers around, most libraries will want this production based on demand; otherwise, this is not a necessary purchase.Danna C. Bell-Russel, Dist. of Columbia P.L.Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus Reviews
The queen of Texas melodrama takes metaphor perhaps a step too far as she pits her heart-transplant-patient heroine against a serial killer obsessed with stopping her new heart. Having as a child survived Hodgkin's disease, her parents' double suicide, and life in a series of substandard foster homes, feisty redhead Cat Delaney is more than able to wisecrack her way through a heart transplant operation at the peak of her career. Famous as a star of the television soap opera Passages, Cat experiences both a literal and figurative change of heart after her surgery, abruptly opting to drop her acting career, move to San Antonio, and create a local news segment aimed at matching abandoned children with good adoptive homes. She breaks off an affair with Dr. Dean Spicer, her wealthy cardiologist, and falls madly in love with Alex Pierce (``His tongue was nimble, his appetite carnal''), a Houston cop turned mystery writer whose sudden appearance in her life may not be coincidental. When newspaper articles describing murders of other heart transplantees begin appearing in Cat's mailbox, she realizes she's being stalked by a lunatic obsessed with stilling the heart of a loved one who may or may not be her donor. As the anniversary of Cat's transplant nears, the threat of violence grows greater. But from which direction comes the danger?: From her hostile secretary, possibly related to a woman who was murdered on the day of her transplant? From the stepfather of one of Cat's orphan clients, whose greatest rival may have been Cat's donor? Or (horrors) from sexy Alex, whose past holds more secrets than she could ever guess? Highly schematic and hastily sketched, this nevertheless provides a satisfying dose of Brown's (Where There's Smoke, 1993, etc.) famously raunchy sex scenes (`` `I want to know I'm with a man. I want to be taken. I want--' `You want to be fucked.' ''), and a certain raw enthusiasm that will no doubt increase her legion of fans. (First printing of 300,000; Literary Guild main selection) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
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