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Title: Up Island is down for the count
Review: The book starts off with some interesting characters, one of the best of which is the witch-y, grasping mother, who (unfortunately for the plot and the readers) croaks right when she gets to being nastiest. It reads like the poorest of formulaic shmoozing---you've got your sultry South, you've got your sleepy New England village, you've got your Wuthering "Heathcliffe" thinly disguised as a dying creep, who could have been interesting if only he'd done more than WHINE. And you've got your gratuitous, graphic, unemotional sex. Plus, the heroine NEVER SOLVES HER OWN PROBLEMS. Time and again she is rescued by some bystander who plays a minimal role and just comes along with a blast of cavalry bugles.The writing deserved a better story. The story deserved, well, maybe to be drenched in brandy and flambee'd. The only cliche missed was to throw in a Crown Prince of somewhere. Miss it.
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