Hot Under Pressure by Kathleen O’Reilly
by SB Sarah | August 04, 2009 | Tuesday at 10:00 am | 18 Comments
Ashley lives with her mom, her sister, and her niece in Chicago after a painful divorce. David lives by himself and travels all over the US for his job, working 90% of his waking hours, following an equally painful divorce. When they end up sitting next to one another on a crowded flight that’s delayed for hours before finally being cancelled, they notice each other, and realize that parts of themselves they thought might have been extinct are working just fine.
Usually I dislike the whole “Instant bonerating attraction, oh wait, our sex is meaningful, my wang is a divining rod, you are the ONE” storyline a LOT. Like, heaping, steamy piles of a lot.
But O’Reilly works it and works it hard and well and I couldn’t put the book down. Once Ashley and David notice each other, and realize that that notice is mutual, well, they put their inhibitions on notice and head for an airport motel, literally running through the terminal. The two progress from glances to trying to share the armrest to small conversations to white hot burning sexual tension in a small amount of time, and… read more »
This book fascinated me because I get the feeling this was a heroine that most category readers would not have expected. Roberts spends a lot of time slowly building the character of Suzannah Morningstar, which is partially accomplished by a gradual reveal of her backstory. There’s no giant dump of revelation, where she spills her life’s story to the hero. She reveals herself deliberately and in small portions, and that slow discovery reveals as much as the actual details. Within that backstory, Roberts tackles some heroine standards head on and knocks them around a good bit. She plays with the virginal expectation of the heroine (Suzannah is a single mom; she’s definitely not a virgin), the purity expectation of the heroine (See #1), and in doing so creates a tough, edgy, unapologetic heroine who doesn’t think much of her son’s father because he obviously doesn’t think much of them, if he thinks of them at all. No angst, no bitterness, no self-pity—just factual hard reality. Savannah is not a victim; she made her choices and learned to work through them. 
Dear Harlequin USA: 
Until I picked up this book, I’d never read a Betty Neels book, and I was not disappointed in the least. And in list format, here are are 6 Important Facts I learned about this novel:
I’m categorizing all my category (har!) reviews under the heading “1001 Ways to Eat Crow” because I’m reading a monster truck shitload of category romance right now, averaging about 75% of a book per day. I read fast. And I’m enjoying them. For the most part. This is an exception. But either way, I’m reading quickly enough that my usual monster session of navel-gazing in a review will have to be trimmed by a good bit for the category binge I’m on now. Avast - here begin ye shorte reviews!
