"Enjoyable second chance romance"

When he was eighteen, Jimmy Scott left Hart's Crossing, Idaho to join the army leaving behind his high school sweetheart Steph Carlson because he felt he was too young to marry. He married Martha and raised three children with her until she passed away three years ago. Steph wed Chuck and raised a daughter until he died last year. After fifty-two years away from his home town except for occasional visits to his parents, Jimmy moves back from Bremerton, Washington to live his final years in Hart's Crossing.

Steph and Jimmy reflect back to their first kiss when he was ten and she was nine on V-J Day. Other memories are just as fond of their times together. Although they were both happily married for decades to different spouses that they still love and cherish, these two grandparents still love one another. However, even with the Thimbleberry Quilt Club praying for this septuagenarian couple coming together, will Steph and Jimmy take that step they did not take over five decades ago?

This enjoyable second chance romance stars two likable elderly protagonists who find love though in the autumn of their lives. The key to the tale is that their deceased spouses were nice people not monsters easily forgotten once scars healed. Instead both enjoyed a fruitful loving marriage after splitting as teens and are now debating coming back together as senior citizens. The second Hart's Crossing tale (see LEGACY LANE for the previous novel) is a fine tale that emphasizes life is to be lived to the fullest at any age.

Harriet Klausner

Reviewed by Harriet Klausner
Posted March 13, 2005