Samhain Publishing, $2.50, ISBN 1-59998-585-3
Contemporary Romance, 2007

In Ladies! Meet Red Hot Alaskan Men, the Alaskan Connection serves to matchmake women with Alaskan men. Clearly, the disastrous reality TV series Bachelorettes in Alaska: Looking for Love has not taught anyone anything. Then again, maybe it’s because nobody watched that TV show and I have just embarrassed myself by revealing that I even know the name of that show.

Charity Cuthbert who runs the Alaskan Connection has a terribly dowdy fashion sense and she is also not cut out for public speaking. This year she plans to bring 100 women to the town of Smithfield but the mayor, Dave Wellington, begs to differ. You see, his heart has been broken by a woman from the lower 48, so now he’s convinced that all women from the lower 48 are wanton heartbreakers with loose morals. In other words, if Dave can’t get laid, he’s determined to ensure that all the men in Smithfield can’t either.

Then again, given how Dave actually uses the phrase “red-lipped floozies” as if he’s a tight-lipped character played by Nathan Lane, I suspect that there may be other reasons why he wants to keep the men in his town all pent-up with frustration. Maybe he’s just waiting for them to reach boiling pot before he accidentally drops the soap in front of them? I ask you, which hot-blooded heterosexual male would use “desperate nymphomaniacs” as an insult?

That probably explains how the frigid weirdo and the closeted misogynist twit can actually get together to have some of the most painful “Hate you! Let’s shag!” moments ever, and I’m not talking about the lack of use of lubrication, just to make this clear. Dave and Charity come off like cartoon characters rather than realistic characters, especially with Dave often talking like a parody of an agony aunt in the 19th century telling women that they will go to hell if they dare enjoy having sex with a man.

I’m glad these two get to have sex to prove… something, I suppose. I’m only grateful that this story is short.