I fell in love with the Donovan series many years ago and have just replaced my original almost falling-apart paperbacks with hardcover versions from some Amazon resources. It's a worthwhile endeavor, IMHO, because this series is outstanding!! There are four books (Amber Beach, Jade Island, Pearl Cove and Midnight on Ruby Bayou) and each is a sparkling gem! (No pun intended) Elizabeth Lowell has created a family anyone would adore to belong to, and heroes that are studly, gorgeous, talented, human and - occasionally - very funny!! A touch that appeals to me, since I like to know my romances have a sense of humor.Here, Honor Donovan is on a quest for her missing brother Kyle. She's helped by the hunky Jake Mallory, but whether he's actually helping or serving his own agenda isn't always clear. What is clear is the heat building between the two of them, and Honor gives as good as she gets. In more ways than one. The story, as are all the stories in this series, gets super detailed about a valuable gem - here, obviously, it's amber. For me, this is an additional treat, since Ms. Lowell really gets into the history, the physiology and the life of amber. It's a biological gem, one of the few, and the facts/educational passages are woven into the story with great skill, avoiding the "lecture" mode, but becoming an integral part of the plot. I wanted to go out and find my own piece of amber when I'd finished this book.These four novels are the reason I began to adore Elizabeth Lowell's work. Their appeal has never diminished and this summer I retired to sit in front of my A/C with all of them stacked beside me. It's a mini vacation with old friends who are as fun to be with now as they were when we first met so many years ago. I heartily recommend the series; start with Amber Beach. It's a hot romance, an intricate tale of international goings-on and a superb kick-off to the other three books. I don't have a favorite - I love them all. And that's saying something! LOLLOL
Amber Beach is going back a while in my re-read queue, back to earlier days of Elizabeth Lowell's romantic suspense novels. It's the first of her Donovans series, which to this day remain among my favorites of hers. Not because they're particularly better written or less formulaic than her later work, but more because I'm partial to the family of characters she depicts. Plus, while the cast travels all over the globe, they're headquartered in Seattle. And I'm a sucker for books that reference Pike Place Market, what can I say?Anyway, her Donovan clan is fairly fun. You've got a large group of brothers and sisters, all headed up by a forceful tycoon of a father and a hugely talented painter of a mother, and the various stories of the series all focus upon a particular sibling. Since the siblings also run an international jewelry business, each book focuses upon the starring sibling's particular favorite gem. Amber Beach's jewel du jour is of course amber, and its heroine is Honor, one of the two Donovan sisters. Honor's desperate to find her missing brother Kyle, desperate enough to overcome her own phobia about going out on the water and hiring a man to help her search the San Juan Islands by boat. This being a romantic suspense novel, Jake Mallory, the man she hires, does of course have an agenda of his own. And his reasons for finding Kyle are much less benign. And, of course, there are Bad Guys out to find Kyle too, along with agents of the US government. Every last one of 'em is out to find out what Kyle knows about the fabled Russian Amber Room, and the fortune in amber from it that's gone missing.Like I said, formulaic, but it's a decent enough light read. Three stars.
What do You think about Amber Beach (2001)?
Tightly packaged crime thriller set in the San Juan Islands, featuring a frantic manhunt for Kyle Donovan and a panel of a fabled Tsarist treasure, the Amber Room. Very fine writing.There is no place called the Amber Beach so the title is a bit disconcerting. The heroine is young sister Honor Donovan, dispatched to check on the missing brother's seaside cottage, and finding herself entangled in the multiple search parties, official and freelance, US and Russian. She teams up with adventurer Jake Mallory, they fall in lust and love, and he is approved by the older Donovan brothers. Interesting sexual banter and build up.I learned a lot about amber, its provenance and its appeal to humans since the Stone Age. Honor learned a lot about driving a power boat and a little about deep sea fishing. I think the author must have applied her own learning there, it was incredibly complex. I started getting confused with the multiple parties tracking them, dropping in on them, etc. and frankly did not quite get the beauteous temptress Marju's role in the whole villainous plot. I am surprised the author understood the Byzantine layers of politics well enough to write about them!All ended well, and love triumphs in the end.
—Saadia
When Honor Donovan finds out her brother, Kyle, is missing, she heads to the San Juan Islands in the Pacific Northwest to find him. Kyle is rumored to have stolen a fortune in amber, including a panel from Russia's Amber Room which was stolen by the Nazis in WWII. The police are hounding her and Honor knows Kyle wouldn't steal the gems. Determined to find him, Honor hires a "fishing guide" to help her search the islands. But Jake Mallory is not really a fishing guide. He has been doing business with Kyle Donovan and suspects that Kyle set him up to take the fall for stealing the amber.I have mixed feelings about this book. I liked the relationship between Honor and Jake. There was real conflict between them and the fact her brother was accused of stealing the amber and making it look like Kyle was behind it. My problem with the story was there being so many people including the Feds, Russian operatives, Coast Guard, and mafia also looking for the gems. I was confused as to who was on what side of the conflict. There was also loads of information on fishing, the care and handling of boats, and how to tell if Amber is real or fake. Just too much detail for me that slowed down the story. My rating: 3.5 Stars.
—Robin
2014 update: It's funny how much my perception of old favorites changes as my reading history changes. With this re-read, I realized how incredibly insta-love this book was. There was absolutely no depth of relationship between the hero and heroine, and they fell in love in a matter of days (possibly hours). But I didn't care, I still found the book yummy. These older Elizabeth Lowell books really appealed to me, with their dark and dangerous heroes who want to protect their heroines. Tell Me No Lies still remains one of my favorite books because of that. Also, it's really too bad Elizabeth Lowell never wrote more in this series (though that's a familiar refrain from us readers for several of her series!)12/7/2011 update: Re-read. Used to reread this series often but haven't in years. An old favorite. I felt Honor might have been a little too insistent on staying, in the face of danger, but I still love the chemistry between her and Jake.
—Angela James
