You know my theory – you never forget the first romance you ever read. Paige is looking for hers:
So I’ve recently become nostalgic for the first romance I ever read, but
unfortunately, when my mom found it hidden under my bed many years ago, she
confiscated it and got rid of is, so I was hoping you romance aficionados
would help me out and be able to pull a title from somewhere so I could find
it and read it again.Here’s what I remember:
It was a Harlequin published sometime between 2000-2003; and I’m pretty
sure it was a Blaze imprint or something of that ilk.The plot is pretty fuzzy:
It took place in a beach town, and heroine goes there to solve the mystery
of a murder or kidnapping of a sister, mother, brother, uncle?
It possibly took place in the aftermath of the crime
Heroine used to go there as a girl and she might have had some bad memories
of the town.Hero is a policeman or security officer or some sort of investigator who is
also connected to the crime.He moved into her home after she got threatened by whoever perpetrated the
crime and they have saucy encounters at night—including one in the
kitchen I believe.They have sex near the end and forget a condom (I’m pretty sure) and she
was a 30 year old virgin (I know, because I was like WTF at the time) and
she didn’t tell him until right before or right after they had sex.So they had sex in the beach house until the sun came up. Then the hero
leaves and captures the bad guy (or she gets captured and he comes after
her, but I’m not sure) and she feels betrayed after he leaves for whatever
reason. She stays in the beach town.I can’t remember if their reconciliation happens right away or if they
spend a few months away from each other, but anyway, HEA
And guess what, she’s pregnant from their one night of passion.
Of course she does. I don’t know why everyone is giving Twilight such attention for raising the possibility of abstinence. All these heroines getting knocked up after one bangin’ would have been enough to convince me to stay chaste forever.
Hmmm… It’s probably not a Blaze if they delay the sexxing for that long. It sounds a little like a Jessica Andersen* Harlequin Intrigue book, The Sheriff’s Daughter, but I think that may be too recent, 2005 maybe. It did have a seaside town and a lawman and some coed mystery solvage. The heroine was a vet, I believe, and I remember some shooting early on in the book.
* Sorry, Jess, for mangling your hard work.
Sounds like one of Tara Janzen’s books- Crasy Kisses, maybe.
H/h are Kid Chaos and Nikki. There’s a beach in Fl, I believe,
a sister, though she’s still alive, and some kind of mystery.
Personally, I think Edward’s insistence on chastity is one of the things that makes him attractive and marks him as a young man “out of time.” The emphasis on male purity especially is definitely from another age and another world view.
Not sure about the book, but my bus driver in jr. high told us she got pregnant the first time she had sex. It gave me pause…but uh…well ya know.
Spam word: Clear38…clearly I am not 38, yet!
Sarah, I hope you find the book you’re looking for. I’ve been looking for a short story I read in a colection of love stories back in the early 90’s. It was about this couple that fell madly in love in high school and how his parents pull out all the stops to break them up. At the end he marries somebody else and the girl he really loves is at the wedding and he doesn’t even recognize her. If that rings any bells for anybody please give me a clue. I really want to reread this and see if it’s as amazing as I remember it.
Thanks.
@Emily Bryan
I’d like to think you are joking, but I doubt it. What Stephenie Meyers wrote was abstinence pornography. This article explains it better than I can:
http://bitchmagazine.org/article/bite-me-or-dont
My cousin told me she could time the conception of her first son to the exact 5 minutes, since it happened the first time she tried sex.
Now that was daunting, immediately pregnant and it only lasted 5 minutes.
Still, it takes a lot to discourage me.
Don’t know the name of the book, but why is it only in romances that people “make love until the sun comes up”:)?
wait wait wait. is she psychic? and she’s been abstinent because she can read peoples’ thoughts and the guys she tried to date were always thinking “hehehe gettin’ some tail from the weird chick” which (understandably) turned her off? and the hero was a rich boy out of towner? and she had a psycho uncle who was a preacher and who was trying to persecute her as a witch for her psychic abilities?
or else the one I’m thinking of is similar but with the psychic stuff tossed in…
and I can’t think of the title or author of the one with the psychic, so other than maybe stimulating (har) someone’s memory, I’m not a heckuva lotta help.
Phyllis,
I’m pretty sure that you’re describing “The Missing” by Shiloh Walker. I liked it a lot, but it came out last year and it’s definitely not a Blaze.
hmmm… i think you’re right. Sorry!
From the time I was pretty young, I knew you could get pregnant the first time. I was born almost exactly nine months after my parents’ wedding, and Dad always insisted that I was proof that they waited until they were married. They were good, non-contraceptive-using Catholics, and Mom had six kids before their seventh anniversary. It took me a while as an adult to realize that wasn’t how it ALWAYS worked.
It sounds like “To the Ends of the Earth” by Elizabeth Lowell.