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Whistle Stopper - Fully Involved
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List Price: $15.95
Our Price: $6.40
Your Save: $ 9.55 ( 60% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Bold Strokes Books
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9781933110998
ISBN: 1933110996
Label: Bold Strokes Books
Manufacturer: Bold Strokes Books
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 233
Publication Date: 2007-12-10
Publisher: Bold Strokes Books
Studio: Bold Strokes Books
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: A good solid book
Comment: Reid Webb and Jimmy Grant had been friends since they were children. Where you saw one, you saw the other. It was only natural that they would decide together to become firefighters and that they would end up in the same station. They depended on each other for everything and their families formed one extended family. When Jimmy's wife died in an accident, Reid and her mother stepped in to help raise Jimmy's young son, Chase. What they didn't count on was Jimmy dying in a fire under circumstances that leave Reid believing she caused his death. Now she knows she has to help provide stability in Chase's life and that means dealing with his Aunt Isabel, who arrives to be Chase's guardian. Reid fell in love with her when they were much younger, but she thought Isabel was straight and she was Jimmy's sister, so definitely forbidden territory. Isabel has her own feelings about Reid. When they were children she resented the relationship Jimmy had with Reid and not with her. Now, she blames Reid for her brother's death, not so much for the accident, but because she drew him into the life of firefighting. What they have in common is a love for Chase and the determination they both have to give him the best life possible now. As the two women struggle with their grief and anger, they realize they have to work together and then that an attraction is growing between them. There are a lot of issues that have to be resolved before they can decide if they want to be "fully involved," maybe too many issues.
Erin Dutton does an exceptional job of creating the personalities of her players. Reid Webb is a strong character - brave, stoic, guilt ridden. She has the patience to deal with a small child and his hurt, but not with the woman she loves. Isabel is a study in contradictions, one moment admiring Reid for the courage she shows and how she seems to instinctively understand Chase, and the next hating her for what happened to Jimmy. Chase struggles to be the "man" he knows his father would want him to be while trying to understand how one little fellow could have so many bad things happen to him. The strength of the characters' emotions pour from the page and will catch the reader up in the story. This is not a sad book, but there are certainly parts that will cause tears to rise. Yet, it is also a story of hope, of how people can put their lives back together after great tragedy and how the definition of "family" needs to be revised for the world today.
This is one of the better books out there to read.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Slow burn
Comment: Reid has made the mistake of falling in love with her best friend's sister, Isabel, who is straight. When Reid's best friend dies while putting out a fire, Isabel is left to raise her nephew, Chase. Moving back to her home town is easier than Isabel thought, and since Reid is her next-door neighbor, she offers to help with Chase. The two women grapple with their feelings of atraction, guilt, regret and loss and eventually establish a relationship that grows into love.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Dutton Delivers Again
Comment: It's really nice to see a new voice in this community deliver not only on her first novel, but on her second novel as well. I could easily become an avid fan of Erin Dutton if she continues to deliver this level of quality writing.
Firefighter Reid Webb's best friend dies while fighting a fire. Feeling extreme guilt, she takes the responsibility of taking care of his orphaned son, Chase, very seriously. In walks, Isabel Grant, Chase's aunt to take him back home with her. Convincing her to wait a while for the boy's sake, Reid tries to show Isabel why it's important to let Chase stay in the only home he has ever known. In fact, Reid and her mother are more like family to Chase than his aunt.
Here, Dutton delivers a great story. Unlike her debut novel, `Sequestered Hearts,' where the character development was confined between the book's cover, Reid and Isabel are both extremely well-developed characters inside an imaginative and believable storyline that leaves the reader hoping for more. The story is steamy, yet tasteful and keeps the reader engaged from the first page to the last. The author takes the reader on a true roller coaster ride as the protagonists experience emotional highs and lows, the scenery is great, and many questions are left unanswered until the last few pages - effectively keeping the reader on the edge of her proverbial seat. Nice job.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Totally enjoyable and fast paced with good character development
Comment: This was a nice change of pace romance to read. I especially liked the diversity of characters. Having one be a firefighter was out of the ordinary and I enjoyed that aspect very much. The story flowed for me and I devoured the book in two days while on vacation. The resolution was delightful and I thought it was great that the novel had a host of interesting characters.
I am looking forward to reading the author's other novels -
Sequestered Hearts
A Place to Rest
Designed For Love
Customer Rating:
Summary: Solid effort by the author; an inoffensive read
Comment: I liked the premise of this book, as far as I could tell from the publisher's synopsis. And this book had great strengths. I really appreciated the little details about fire fighting and even day-to-day living with which Erin Dutton imbued the lives of her characters. It really helped to flesh out events. The author has a tendency to rely too heavily on "showing" what her characters are going through internally through their actions, then tacking on internal dialogue and other motivational explanations after the action, but at least she does include relatively strong inner voices to flesh out these people.
Emotionally, the book was a tad uneven and rather like a roller coaster. It was amusing to have one of the characters actually bring up the roller coaster metaphor, but I really felt at times like I was getting mental whip lash from the dramatic stops and starts and about-faces these characters executed throughout the book, sometimes with no warning (though, as I mentioned, even the most confusing or frustrating of actions was generally well-supported through motivational exposition following the sudden events).
The family structure was charming. And as one who has had deaths of those close to me, I couldn't help but be touched and project extra emotion into my reading of this book.
I agree that the ending could have been fleshed out. But this seems to be a common complaint in this genre.
This book has flaws, but is above-average in its execution. I enjoy the way this author handles emotion and character, but would like her to develop a more consistent or strong narrative voice; think about what the book is trying to say about relationships. I will definitely look for her future works, however, and recommend this one as a quick read, with some poignant moments related to coping with death and loss, interesting insight into the lives of fire fighters, and exploration of the many types of love we hold in the various relationships in our lives.
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Editorial Reviews:
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A love that has smoldered for years ignites when two women and one little boy come together in the aftermath of tragedy.
An early morning hotel fire turns out to be anything but routine, and firefighter Reid Webb's best friend and partner, Jimmy Grant, dies. Guilt-ridden and grieving, Reid feels responsible for her partner's young son, Chase. She would do anything for him, even if that means spending far too much time in the company of the woman she's harbored feelings for since high school. Isabel Grant doesn't know anything about raising children. But when she returns to her hometown to assume custody of her orphaned nephew, she gets a crash course. Isabel's struggle to keep her footing in the midst of chaos is further complicated by her growing attraction to Reid, a woman whom Isabel blames for her brother's death.
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