Happy endings are much better if you don’t run into a tree. Take my word on this. Heather, however, wants to revisit the book wherein she learned this wisdom:
There was a bookstore that had 5 WALLS of romance novels – used – for very
cheap.anyway. I read this one that wasn’t better than any of the others for any
reason, but was the only one that stayed in my memory for some reason. So
I keep doing multiple google searches on the contents, to no avail.
SO .. maybe you can help me. I will type up my mish mash 20 year old
memory of the story line/stand out scenes and maybe you can help.Girl – lovely, of course – hoping to hire a man to take her through a
jungle or down a river to either find her missing father, or something her
dead father had found and she felt obligated to go get.
She finds said man in the arms of a woman and is disgusted, but interrupts
anyway to haughtily tell him she would like to hire him. she either
promises him money she does have or maybe some treasure that will be found
at the end of the trip, I’m unsure.there is, of course, fiery hidden attraction between them.
He fights it but takes the job, they go down this river. there is
potential malaria, lots of rain, and him fighting his baser instincts and
being very noble. at one point they are getting frisky and he reluctantly
pushes her away and she runs off in the rain and i believe runs into a
tree. but maybe that is me mashing together this story and The Princess
Bride. who knows.anyway. that is all i remember. not very helpful, huh?
If you can find this book, I would be really thankful even if I don’t know
why I want to even read it again!
This sounds like a candidate for “I read this sh*t so you don’t have to.” Honestly. Anyone remember this book?
Don’t know the book but we’ve got the start of a mammoth reading list of jungle trek romances.
@Maria & Karenmc—we have a powerline (read, squirrel highway) running along the back of my yard. The squirrels used to stop halfway across to taunt my scottie and make obscene remarks with their tails. He’d leap mightily upwards (all of maybe 4 inches) to try to GET THOSE PESKY SQUIRRELS hoping all the time, day in and day out for years that just one day, one day for maybe a minute gravity would decide to fail and he’d GET THEM. Funniest thing you ever saw and it went on every morning without fail til the day the dog died. Squirrels and dogs are some of the best theatre out there!
@Jessica Andersen
If the phrase “big hairy Yeti balls” turns up in your love scene…then you have every right to hunt me down.
I’ll be the one laughing and holding out a big ol’ glass of Long Island iced tea to purge those words from your mind.
Could it be Just a Kiss Away by Jill Barnett? I don’t remember anyone running into a tree, but the plot does sound similar. Good book.
“Arriving on a lush Pacific island, Eulalie Grace LaRue was soon to be reunited with the father she hadn’t seen since childhood. Yet before Lollie’s dreamed-of meeting could take place, the lovely Southern belle was caught in the crossfire of a violent revolution—and thrown into the rugged arms of Sam Forester.
On the run in the jungle, the battle-scarred soldier of fortune didn’t know what to do with the pampered blonde placed in his care. Survival was his top priority, but he could not resist Lollie’s seductive charm…or deny the growing attraction between them. Though Sam thrived on chance and risk, falling in love was the one chance he wasn’t willing to take.
Powerless against the desire that consumed them both, Lollie surrendered to his passionate embrace. But when he dismissed her affections, she was determined to fight for him…to prove that in the steamy heat of paradise, two hearts would find the love of a lifetime….”
Feel sure I’ve read this. If it’s not HoF by Howard, my next guess is The Fall of Maggie Brown by Anne Stuart.
I thought of the Anne McAllistar “Marriage Trap” as well, I always kinda liked it, because her missionary parents were really, really awful. I know I’ve got several other sexy jungle trek’s in a box somewhere, but this is the only one I apparently have fond memories of.
The JAK book that takes place in a Pacific island jungle is “Silver Linings”, but this sounds more like Dark Fire to me. Also Debbie Macomber has 2 books with a similar plot; Sooner Or Later; from the Amazon review “a rough, tough, unmanageable alpha male, who’s hired by a prim and proper Texas woman to find her missing brother in a terrorist-ridden Central American country.” and Moon Over Water; from the Amazon review “Framed for the theft of an ancient artifact and pursued by the police, a drug dealer nursing a grudge, and a crazed archaeologist, Lorraine finds herself thrust into the questionable company of Jack Keller, retired mercenary. Jack’s task is to get Lorraine safely back to the United States—all the while avoiding border patrols—but Lorraine keeps landing in trouble, right up to her pretty neck! Will the seemingly star-crossed lovers make it out of the jungle alive?”
Both of these sound like possibilities.
@ joykenn…there was a squirrel in our yard who used to play with Harley the Beagle’s toys after he went inside.
His Wicked Kiss by Gaelen Foley? Eden is the daughter of a famous orchid hunter and she and the hero have various wild adventures in the jungle. Can’t say for sure but I seem to remember the running out of the tent and into a tree….
I can’t believe how many books are similar!
Hilarious & awesome.
It is not either of those, and Silver Linings was not the JAK example I had in mind; nor is it her A Coral Kiss. There’s at least one more even in Jayne’s oeuvre, and as she has written an awful lot of books, and I have all of them, it would take me a long time to check.
As I said, this was a very, very popular theme in the 1980s, so there will be literally scores of books that have some elements in common with the original query.
🙂
I think I’ve read this one, too.
I’m thinking it might be a Lindsay McKenna mercenaries story, and that some other mercenaries have to come in and rescue them after they discover her father and the treasure and are horribly betrayed by the other members of their party. (leading to the two of them trekking through the jungle alone, and making hot lurrve in the midst of the swarming malaria mosquitos and jungle mould.)
I can’t be sure of this, of course because I read a whole bunch of similar stories at once. My book source between 1997 and 2007 was a friend who was a voracious book collector, but went on sprees (mercinaries, cowboys, knights, regencies, etc.) Frankly, when you get the opportunity to borrow 30 new books at a time, you don’t quibble over the theming.
I went though at LEAST 96 books trying to find this one off my shelf! (what? I have my shelves stacked two-deep…)
Holy Moly! I totally forgot about my request during a whirlwind month, and checked back to see all these posts 🙂
None of the books listed so far sound quite like the one I’m thinking of (she runs into the tree while running through the rain after a hot and heavy make out session that he aborts after realizing what he’s doing, becuase .. of COURSE he’s not good enough for her)
I’m pretty sure that it starts in the United States, in a southern town (i said Louisiana because it felt right)
She had either already hired him or was in search ofh im (don’t you love these vagueries?) when she saw him with a sexy lady and was horrified. but it wasn’t in a bar. I think she went to his house and he was there with the woman or the woman was leaving.
I remember malaria. the running through the rain and slipping and hitting the tree.
it was a totally stupid oft-repeated storyline but for some reason it was hot hot HOTT. or at least it was to my then-19 year old self and i’m dying to know if my um.. older self would find it so still!
The time period was sometime in the 1800’s i would guess, although it could have been around 1900.
definitely the era of big-ass gowns, though and steam engines.
thanks for all the input, by the way. it’s not any of the books listed so far.
I believe they were alone on the river together a lot. and the cover was definitely a bodice ripper sort of cover. and not modern.
some of these others sound fun, though! thanks!
I’m having a hunch now it might be Nobody’s Darling by Teresa Medeiros. I’ll go look through my copy and see if it fits.
No, don’t think.