Silver Thaw

December 1, 2014
Anderson’s series launch, set in Mystic Creek, Ore., recovers quickly from a sappy beginning where the heroine details her misery on strips of pink paper that she tosses to the wind outside her inadequate home. Plucky Amanda Banning and her daughter, Chloe, are on the run from her abusive husband. Banning is assisted in her fresh start by handsome Jeb Sterling, carpenter and pillar of the Mystic Creek community. Compassionate Jeb finds the papers on which Amanda scribbles her woes and starts worrying about his unknown but unhappy neighbor. When a blizzard strikes, he finds Amanda and Chloe, brings them to his home for shelter, and gives Amanda a job. Jeb is too perfect to be true, falling for Amanda immediately and spending a fortune to protect her and her child from the monster she married, but his decency and genuine devotion are convincing as Amanda learns to trust again. Romance veteran Anderson (Walking on Air) is a pro at making readers weep, despite her folksy, sappy characters and clichéd story. Agent: Steve Axelrod, Steve Axelrod Agency.

Starred review from December 1, 2014
Some people send messages in a bottle, but Amanda Banning writes her innermost thoughts on bits of pink paper and sends them blowing in the wind. It is her only means of communication now that she is hiding from her sadistic husband, Mark, in a ramshackle rental on the outskirts of the isolated community of Mystic Creek, Washington. Amanda knows the next time her monstrous spouse beats her and their little girl, Chloe, he won't stop until they are both dead. Rancher Jeb Sterling doesn't like littering, but as he reads these missives, he realizes that they are a window into someone's soul, and he becomes obsessed with finding out who she is. He soon ends up rescuing Amanda and Chloe during a blizzard that destroys their home. They steal Jeb's heart, and keeping them from the hands of an enraged mad man becomes his top priority. Master storyteller Anderson (Walking on Air, 2014) has skillfully penned the heart-wrenching story of domestic abuse and its aftermath, taking readers on an emotional roller-coaster ride and making the terror, dread, distrust, and, eventually, tenuous hope of a battered woman palpable. This compelling first book in the Mystic Creek series will make an excellent book-discussion group selection.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)