"I've been there, Lindsay. And then, like you, I finally came home." He brushed his mouth over hers, taking the question that had formed on her lips. "That's what I'm going to do with you tonight. Take you home. I'll feed you a brandy and we'll play mah-jongg until dawn. If you fall asleep between turns and the nightmare comes again, I'll be there."
Lindsay let out her breath in a rush of sound, feeling a vast relief at not having to go back and face the nightmare alone. "You don't have to do that," she said. "I'm used to-"
"I know," he said, interrupting her with another brush of his lips over hers. "Did you ever think that maybe I dream, too?"
Her eyes widened in surprise, their deep blue color turned to black by fear and the night. "What do you dream about, Catlin?" she whispered.
He gathered her hands from his shirtfront, kissed both palms and hoped that she would never know.
Nothing if not predictable, starting my #TBRChallenge pick Tuesday night!
Not going to lie: I've refreshed your blog more than a few times today, waiting to see what you think of it.
ReplyDelete(Once upon a time--mid-1990s through mid2000s--I obsessively searched for all of Ms Lowell's backlist, and read and re-read many of them to pieces. And yet, I did not remember this one, and had to go look up in my shelf to confirm that yes, yes, I have it and of course, I'd read it)
I was trying to finish it but 500+ pages smacked me in line. I'm 50% right now. I've went through the "they just don't write contemporary like this anymore!" To this feels bloated. All I can say right now is, it's a hell of a story. I want/need to read all the takes on this one.
ReplyDeleteYes, indeed. She certainly could plot and convey a sense of danger and high stakes, but some pruning would have done some of her books good.
DeleteShe also had a problem fetichizing Asians (in both good and negative ways), Indigenous people (same), and so on, but I cut her some slack given when most of that stuff was written (it looks like she stopped writing altogether a few years ago, and her output had slowed down a lot for at least a decade before that)
There's a little bit of that in here, mostly the awe and "newness" of Chinese culture to Western Americans. Walking the line of how of "mystical" and revered.
DeleteI slowed down on this because there are a lot of players and I'm getting immersed into the world but, as long as the green beer doesn't completely take me out today lol, I should be ready to talk/review this on tomorrow (Sat).