Guest Reviewed by Candace
Title: Solomon’s Choice
Author: Emily Mims
Hero/Heroine: Jack Briscoe/ Caroline Stern
Genre: M/F Romance
Length: 773 pages
Publisher: Boroughs Publishing Group
Release Date: October 7, 2013
Available at: Boroughs Publishing Group, Amazon and Barnes & Noble
Add it to your shelf: Goodreads
Blurb: ON CHRISTMAS DAY… the life of Dr. Caroline Stern changed forever. Her husband was murdered, her baby son kidnapped. When she found the boy again, he was with his biological father – a man Caroline never intended to meet.
There seems no obvious tie between Jack Briscoe and the violence of sixteen months prior, but Caroline just wants her son back – something Jack seems unwilling to grant. He wants the boy, too, and when a wily old country judge demands the two of them work out a shared custody arrangement, Caroline finds herself in Texas Hill Country for longer than expected.
Then she learns Jack wants her, too. And she might want him.
In the beautiful town of Verde, on the shores of Lake Templeton, she begins to rebuild her life. But the dark clouds of the past have not vanished completely, and one last storm of deceit remains. A choice must be made, and only the deepest love will see them through.
Review:
Where to start with this book? When you first open the book, you are greeted by two pages with the title, “Jack’s Request.” These two pages detail the aftermath of a sexual encounter between the book’s primary characters, Jack Briscoe and Caroline Stern. It is important to note that these two pages come before the Acknowledgment page, the Copyright, and the Prologue. I found them to be out of place and misleading, especially after reading the prologue. You are left with the impression that perhaps Caroline Stern’s baby, Isaac, who you are introduced to on page 1, is actually the product of an affair with Jack Briscoe. That assumption couldn’t be more incorrect.
The prologue covers the introductions of Dr. Caroline Stern’s family; Dr. Aaron Stern, her husband, and 4 week old baby Isaac Stern. Baby Isaac is a product of an artificial insemination that utilized a sperm donation. Caroline dwells on the fact that they requested a donor who looked like Aaron, small and dark; however, baby Isaac was big-bone with blonde hair and blue eyes. The action quickly moves from the family’s apartment to a rest stop, as the family makes their way to Aaron’s childhood home to celebrate Christmas. While at the rest stop, the first climactic event takes place; Dr. Aaron Stern is shot and killed by an unknown man. Caroline runs to her husband, in an effort to save him; however, it is too late. At the same time, a woman is actively kidnapping baby Isaac. As soon as Caroline realizes what is happening, she runs for Isaac, but the woman and man responsible for the shooting and kidnapping are able to escape with Caroline’s precious baby. The guilt Caroline feels for not running to her child first plagues her throughout the entire book. The prologue is concluded with the woman who kidnapped Isaac turning him over to a waiting couple at the same fertility clinic that Caroline and Aaron had used.
Chapter one begins 16 months after the murder and kidnapping. We are now introduced to Jackson Ryan Briscoe III, a teacher and football coach from a small town in Texas called Verde. Jack is described as the all American man who is loved by nearly everyone in town. Not long in, we are introduced to Ryan, Jack’s son. Jack is juggling a career, coaching, owning and operating a ranch, and being a single parent to Ryan after his wife leaves him. I found myself immediately sympathetic to Jack’s character and hoped this was the beginning of a well written, action packed romance novel. Again, I couldn’t have been more wrong.
It is discovered, after investigation into the fertility clinic, that Ryan is, in fact, Caroline’s missing son, Isaac. The woman who kidnapped Isaac 16 months ago had turned him over to Jack and his ex-wife, Francine. The couple, unaware of the entire kidnapping plot, had paid the fertility clinic for a egg donating, surrogate mother service as Francine was unable to conceive. Jack and Francine had fallen victim to a revenge plot targeted at Caroline and Aaron Stern. This made me even more sympathetic to Jack. Soon after we are introduced to Jack, and learn of Ryan’s origins, we are introduced to Rory, the town Deputy; Betty, the county social worker; Jimmy & Lauren Adamcik, Jack’s best friend and lawyer and his wife; Special Agent Russo, the FBI Agent in charge of the Aaron Stern murder and Isaac Stern disappearance case; and Misty Martinez, Caroline’s best friend and lawyer. This sets the overly convoluted story into motion.
Caroline is introduced to Jack and immediately wants nothing to do with him; her only care is taking her son, who has lived with Jack for the past 16 months of his life, back to Dallas with her. I immediately disliked Caroline’s character at this point. Although the author repeatedly made attempts to allow the reader to be sympathetic to Caroline, I just couldn’t do it. If you rationalize, it is easy to say you should feel sorry for Caroline, especially after everything she had gone through; however, very little focus was put on Caroline’s suffering at the beginning of the book, so I found it difficult to feel anything for her character, especially after she discloses that she doesn’t care at all about Jack’s feelings in the matter. After repeated insinuations by Caroline that Jack was involved in her son’s kidnapping, Caroline resolves that Jack really is also just an innocent victim in this situation. Although Caroline recognizes this, she and Jack are unable to resolve the matter of who will take custody of Isaac-Ryan, so they enlist the help of the court systems. They are ordered by the local judge, Willis Riley aka Wily Riley, to communicate with each other and come to an agreement that is best for Isaac-Ryan.
After much disagreement, and behavior from Caroline that made me, not only unsympathetic toward her character, but flat out hate her, Caroline finally makes a deal with the town of Verde to pay off her student loans in exchange for serving as the town doctor for 7 years. She moves into a house on the beach and begins establishing a connection with her son, who she and Jack agree to call Ryan, and a love interest in Jack. This is where I began having trouble keeping interest in the book. Any love scenes, and they were few and far between, felt forced and poorly written. Caroline actually stopped Jack in the middle of their first sexual encounter to question him about condoms; that’s not really the romantic, lustful encounter I am looking to read about. The action in the sex scenes were glossed over; it was almost as if the writer was afraid to be too graphic. I felt extremely let down. A recurring theme was Caroline’s guilt over betraying her dead husband. This guilt, and the lack of romantic scenes, turned the book into more of a crime novel due to the ever present woman we come to know as Cissy, who is responsible for the original kidnapping of Ryan and murder of Aaron. The only action among many chapters of what I can only call filler material are the letters and baskets of dead kittens Caroline receives from the mystery persons she assumes were responsible for Ryan’s kidnapping and Aaron’s murder. Aside from the occasional threatening note and dead roses, the pages are mostly filled with every day life occurrences and Jack trying fruitlessly to win Caroline’s heart. For a majority of the book, Caroline could be described as cold and unfeeling. The book finally starts to pick up when Ryan is diagnosed with meningitis.
At the point of diagnosis, Caroline and Jack are forced to make a decision to give Ryan an experimental drug in a last ditch effort to save his life. When the drug works, everyone is overjoyed until Ryan begins showing signs of liver failure. Caroline begins to believe she is responsible for making the wrong choice, which could ultimately lead to Ryan’s death. The physician responsible for Ryan’s care tells her that making the correct choice would have required the wisdom of Solomon, and we finally understand where the title comes from. Caroline and Jack agree that the only way to save Jack’s life is for Caroline to donate part of her liver, as she is a 100% match. On the day of the scheduled surgery, Cissy’s boyfriend, Tommy, comes into the hospital and attempts to kill Caroline. Caroline engages in a struggle with Tommy, resulting in his death and a near fatal stab wound to herself. As a result, the transplant Ryan so desperately needs is delayed. Caroline and Jack appeal to the ethics board at the hospital to allow the surgery to move forward, sure that Ryan will die without the surgery. After a guest appearance by Wily Riley, the ethics board agrees to allow the surgery to move forward.
On the day of the surgery, Caroline goes up to Ryan’s room to visit him before the operation and finds Cissy in the room. At this point we discover the whole reason behind Ryan’s kidnapping, Aaron’s murder, and all the subsequent events is an insane payback plot devised because years prior, Caroline was unable to save Cissy’s baby after a vehicle accident. Caroline assures Cissy that she remembers the accident well and knew at the time there was nothing she could do to save Cissy’s baby, so she helped the people she could. Hospital security arrive in time to save Caroline from being shot and Cissy is arrested. Caroline knows the nightmare of the last two years is finally over. After this incident, both Caroline and Ryan go into surgery. All goes well for Ryan, but Caroline crashes and begins to have an out-of-body experience where she sees Aaron in spirit. Aaron tells her that she is not ready to go yet because Ryan and Jack need her; she reluctantly agrees with Aaron and returns to her body.
When Caroline wakes up from surgery she realizes that she is truly in love with Jack and ultimately proposes marriage to him. The book ends with Caroline and Jack’s wedding and promises of happy ever after.
My biggest problems with this book were the inconsistencies in writing style, multiple uses of cliché lines such as, “you can bet your next paycheck on that,” and the odd incorporation of solving relationship problems being referred to as “slaying dragons.” I had a very difficult time staying interested in the story as there were chapter long lulls in action and very few actual scenes between Caroline and Jack that even came close to romance. The book just jumped around too much for my liking.
Overall Impression: It was ok, but not good
*I received a copy of this book from the author in return for a fair and honest review.*
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