Sweet romances are not generally a staple of my reading diet—I tend to favour spice over sugar and usually find myself looking for a dead body and/or some plan to bring down the free world. But having thoroughly enjoyed Tracy March’s delightful THE PRACTICE PROPOSAL, book #1 in her Suddenly Smitten series of lighthearted romances, and wanting hilarious Paige Ellerbee to be my baker BFF, I jumped at the chance to read Paige’s story. TEMPTED IN THE TROPICS proves that Tracy March has mastered the art of the sweet romance, delivering a well-written story that is incredibly fun and sweet (without being saccharine) and full of warm fuzzies, but tempered with the right amount of heat to take it a step beyond your usual Bliss title. And what’s not to love about a Caribbean setting?
Having spent a decade surrounded by (medical) doctor-wannabes and doctors-in-training with overinflated egos, I must confess that I’m a bit prejudiced against doctor heroes. The genius and God complex attitude of many (both in real life and fiction) tends to drive me mad! So I was initially a bit wary of Dr. Lane Anderson and his by-the-book, uptight ways. After the professional and personal debacle of his practice in Austin, Lane arrives in tiny, sleepy Maple Creek, Maryland to run his uncle’s practice for a month while he figures out what’s next in his life (something I can relate to—minus the scandal). Having been burned professionally and personally by his ex-fiancée, he’s quite consumed with re-establishing his medical reputation & ensuring everything he does is completely above reproach and protecting his heart. I can understand his reasons for being so careful and uptight, but it really made me want to loosen him up! Especially since he’s really one of those great doctors who truly cares about his patients. And he saves the day. Plus, he’s ridiculously gorgeous, funny, and sweet. I may be cured of my doctor-hero aversion.
Paige Ellerbee was one of my favourite secondary characters in THE PRACTICE PROPOSAL. She’s smart, she’s sassy, she’s hilarious, and she’s full of heart—when her mother was diagnosed with cancer a few years ago, she left her exciting life in DC to move back to Maple Creek and care for her mum. With her mum now gone and her dad’s barbershop struggling, she can’t bear to leave behind the only family she has left and runs her own struggling bakery in Maple Creek—despite dreaming of home and hearth, which seem hard to come by in a town primarily populated by seniors. She’s the type of character you wish were real so she could be your friend, and the relationships she has with Liza and the Sutherlands (from THE PRACTICE PROPOSAL) are genuine and heartwarming. Willing to wear an orange dress as the maid of honour in Liza’s wedding? That’s a true friend! Her first meeting with Lane is equal parts instant attraction and friction, and the two of them—unwitting subjects of a town-wide matchmaking effort—continue to be sweetly antagonistic until they find themselves in the lush tropical paradise of St. Lucia for Liza’s wedding and decide on a no-strings-attached island fling. Their fling is peppered with hilariously embarrassing scenes (loved the walk of shame and the thong(s)!) that had me chuckling the entire time and garnering strange looks from passersby. And, of course, the fling isn’t really a fling because they both fall for each other but see no way of making it work once they return Stateside. That scene at the end where they resolve their differences will have you going “awwwwww!”. Yes, the timeframe from being complete strangers to being together forever is ridiculously short and completely unrealistic, but it’s such an adorably cute, fun journey that it doesn’t matter.
I really like Tracy’s contemporary voice. It’s fresh, modern, and completely approachable—no big words or delusions of literary grandeur. It doesn’t set out to be anything other than lighthearted and romantic fun, and it reads like any conversation you’d have with your twenty-something friends. She does a great job of laying the groundwork for the physical chemistry between the characters and conveying passion and sensuality whilst having the actual intimate scenes occur behind closed doors, which greatly helped counter my major gripe with Bliss (or similar) titles and made it a more enjoyable read.
TEMPTED IN THE TROPICS is a thoroughly enjoyable, quick read, that will have you laughing out loud AND feeling warm & fuzzy. Definitely recommended for fans of Tracy’s Suddenly Smitten series and anyone who likes their romance of the sweet, lighthearted persuasion—particularly if you like hot doctors. I’m looking forward to the next instalment!
**ARC provided by Publisher**
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Rachel Harris grew up in New Orleans, watching soap operas with her grandmother, and staying up late sneak-reading her mama's romance novels. Today, she still stays up late reading romances, only now she does so openly.
