Karen Kelley's latest series features various female characters from the planet Nerak who find themselves on Earth trying to make sense of the differences between their world and ours. Nerak comes across as a sterile, boring place with no men, no pain, and no pleasure. In this third book in the series, our hero, policeman Sam Jones, finds himself babysitting a Nerakian Healer who has come to Earth to try to find a cure for an earth-borne disease that has been transported to Nerak with some of the visitors. The Healer, Lara, believes she will be able to find the cure from some of Earth's plants. As Nick and Kia (heroes of the last book) live in the city, which is rather short of plants, Sam is persuaded to take Lara with him to his cabin in the middle of nowhere.
Lara is an uptight, superior-seeming woman who knows she's beautiful and thinks everything about Earth is inferior.
As she is introduced to some of the delights of earthly things - chocolate, gambling, showers, sex - she begins to re-evaluate her initial assumptions. When it's time for her to return to Nerak, will she be able to leave Sam, and can he manage without her in his life?
Karen Kelley's writing style is reasonably paced and features some amusing events. However, the
book's overall effect is somewhat disappointing. The novelty of watching Nerakians come to terms with Americans has worn off, now that the
series is three books deep, and Sam's character doesn't feel defined enough for the reader to really get behind him. Lara comes across as selfish, and some aspects of the plot weren't entirely resolved. I assume we will see more of the characters in a future book, but I wasn't inspired enough by this one to search out any others by this author.