Leisure, $5.99, ISBN 0-8439-4865-5
Historical Romance, 2001

I am in awe of Connie Mason’s Avon editor. She or he must have single-handedly polished this author’s works into gloriously campy, hokey, and ludicrous pieces of dime store stories. On the other hand, the Leisure editor probably spends her or his time bashing the head against the toilet wall in hope of clearing the after-effects of reading this author’s rough draft. Which proves, really, that the best editors are those with the strongest threshold for pain.

Don’t believe me? Read The Outlaws: Sam and then tell me if you think that I am wrong.

Now, back to my appreciation of the Avon editor. Seriously, there is an entire universe of difference between the readabilities of this author’s Avon and Leisure books. I can only imagine the long hours the Avon editor has to spend crunching on pencils as the poor dear tries to figure out how to salvage the story.

This one is bad. Really bad. Atrocious even. I only read this book because I was so bored and I needed escape from the news on TV. An almost fatal mistake. If I didn’t lay hard-boiled eggs after this, it must be a sign that there is a merciful creator somewhere out there.

Sam is a wanted man. There is a price on his head. That doesn’t stop him from gambling and brawling in open places. Seriously, I really want to know how the author comes up with plots like this. An old man purchases Sam’s services – ahem, not that sort of services, people. He will help out at a ranch belonging to Lacey. Lacey? Isn’t that the slut who betrayed him? Slut! Bitch! Whore! He will make her pay! Pay, pay, pay!

Can someone pass me the bottle of aspirins? I have a feeling I may need it soon.

Lacey, however, is surprised to see Sam. Why didn’t the man answer her letters? Doesn’t he know she loves him forever! Look, she even has a son whose father is – not her dead husband’s, but Sam’s. But of course, she just cannot tell him anything. Besides, he’s too busy pawing her bosoms to even listen.

Okay, I really don’t know how to go on. Let’s just say there’s a lot of stupid misunderstandings, big and small, all of them unnecessary. When Sam and Lacey are not going at it like a pair of lemmings with genitals superglued together and drunk on pheromones, they are acting like everyone’s favorite trailer park dysfunctional wackos. Sam all but throws Lacey down to the floor in his sexual harassment, and Lacey must have been dropped at the head the day they teach the word NO in school. The joke here is Sam accusing Lacey to be a bad, evil mother as opposed to him, a good daddy because he spends time with the poor boy for, oh, a few hours so far.

And did I tell you about this other odious man who wants Lacey too? Sam knows the Other Man is scum, but at the same time, he also convinces himself that the Other Man is helping himself to Sam’s sloppy seconds. No, wait… could it be that this ugly, odious pig is actually the first and Sam’s the one poking the sloppy seconds? Could the boy be the son of the fat, disgusting, ugly, odious Other Man’s…?

“No! Slut! Whore! Bitch! Whore! Bitch! Slut!”

Here we go again.

Can someone pass me some tissues? I think my nose is starting to bleed.