Any Way You Want It
Kathy Love
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East meets West across time and tradition as three young American women and their Indian immigrant mothers take first steps toward true sisterhood, shattering secrets and sharing joy and tears in Kathy Love's
Any Way You Want It
.




Buy *Any Way You Want It* by Kathy Love online

Any Way You Want It
Kathy Love
Brava
Paperback
320 pages
January 2008
rated 3 of 5 possible stars

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In a lot of ways, Any Way You Want It is reminiscent of Dark Melody by Christine Feehan: a musician singing in a band at a bar stumbles across a woman with whom he falls instantly in love, but the woman has some troubled history with men which has left her unsure of herself, so the hero does his best to build her up. Of course, there are also differences between the books; in this story, the hero, Ren Anthony, is a vampire who believes he is cursed so that any woman who falls in love with him will die, thus he avoids any kind of deep relationship with a woman; the heroine, Maggie, is recovering from being jilted on her wedding day by her fiancé, Peter, and has made a wish for a fling while on holiday in New Orleans.

The first third of the book shows Maggie and her friends visiting New Orleans and finding themselves in a bar opposite their hotel, where Ren and his band, The Impalers, are performing. Ren and Maggie are attracted to each other but are very different people, so Maggie's desire for a Wild Fling seems rather out of her reach because of her history with Peter and her lack of self-confidence. Fortunately for Maggie and for the plot, slim as it is, she gets over this by page 100, and most of the next hundred pages are Maggie and Ren having sex, with the final fifth of the book consisting of Maggie working out what Ren is and having to overcome his fear of his curse.

There are other side characters in this book, most of whom don't have too much of a part to play apart from Ren's half-brother, Vittorio, who will probably appear in a future book. The main action is always between Ren and Maggie in a 'fated lovers' kind of way with the plot enhanced slightly as they both bring a certain amount of healing to each others' wounds.

This is a reasonable read but it lacks depth, and the 'big misunderstanding' idea - that Ren can't allow anyone to love him because he's cursed - seems rather too facilely removed; either that, or Ren is remarkably dense to have misunderstood the nature of the curse. The vampiric part of Ren's nature is very understated (no bloodsucking here); it's his longevity which adds more interest to the story because of part of his history with which Maggie is familiar.

The New Orleans setting adds a little extra to Any Way You Want It, which is readable but ultimately forgettable.



Originally published on Curled Up With A Good Book at www.curledup.com. © Helen Hancox, 2008

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