Avon, $5.99, ISBN 0-06-000180-1
Romantic Suspense, 2002

Now that the likes of Joan Johnston, Rachel Lee, and Teresa Hill have enjoyed great success in trauma porn stories, Cait London, who has been writing as long as if not longer than most of these ladies must be gritting her teeth. Damn it, she too can be the new Trauma Porn Queen. Unfortunately, When Night Falls is the most discordant trauma porn entry this author has ever served up.

In fact, I am still rather unsure what this story is about, unless a catalog of the characters’ dysfunctions, all made with the subtlety of a stone drill on my skull, is what we consider a “story” nowadays. Uma Thornton witnessed the death of her friend right before her eyes a year before and now she is screwed up so much that you can easily use her to hold two planks and an iron bar together.

Mitchell Warren comes home, and he has a history with her. Something about he being unworthy of love, guilt-ridden over his failed marriage, baggage from his parents’ divorce, and a zillion more self-inflicted “macho” garbage – it’s like a dark cloud of Chernobyl stink blowing into Madrid, Oklahoma.

Not that Madrid, Oklahoma is any nice place to live in to begin with. Everyone seems to have secrets, everyone is nasty, everyone is screwed up so much so that we can stock a DIY store forever with these tools. Mitchell has kissed Uma once long ago when he is hurting like hell over his broken relationship, and his baggage, all inherently selfish and self-absorbed, becomes his excuse to lust and paw and push away Uma. Uma, her baggage inherently selfless and stupidly martyr-tinged, becomes everybody’s favorite whipping post. Two people happily slashing each other and themselves with the blades of their guilt and self-pity. Every flirtation, every consummation, and every second-guessing of the other becomes yet more excuse to sulk, whine, indulge in self-pity, and scream.

Oh, and there’s a serial killer in here. Or something. Not that we need that loser, because if you ask me, our hero and heroine here are doing a splendid job already killing me slowly. Maybe it’s time someone go to that small town and do everybody a favor by erecting a billboard that says: “Oh grow up!”