Author:
Narrator: Laural Merlington
Format: Abridged-CD, Paperback, Unabridged-MP3
Publisher: Brilliance Corporation
Published: Jan 2008
Genre: Fiction - Romance - Contemporary
Retail Price: $14.99
Discs: 3
This Elizabeth Lowell novel is an expanded edition of her 1983 classic. Though the romance genre has shifted significantly since this was written, Beautiful Dreamer is a timeless treasure that relies on rock-solid character development and exquisitely descriptive language.
Hope Gardener's Nevada ranch is dying from an extended drought and a sinking water table. Rio is an intriguing stranger who offers his skills to help discover a hidden well that could save her ranch. As their symbolic search for a well progresses, so does their struggle to find hope in their developing relationship. Rio is a 'brother to the wind' whose natural state is to travel and breathe life into other people's dreams. Hope, of course, is a ranch girl, whose own dreams tie her to her land.
Though plot devices come knocking on the door with the subtlety of the Publishers Clearing House sweepstakes crew, it somehow doesn't seem that annoying. Hope is strong and optimistic without being an airhead, and Rio is just the right amount of tall, dark, handsome, and troubled without being emotionally stunted. --Nancy R.E. O'Brien