Holding the Dream, the 2nd book in Nora Roberts Dream series continues with the story of Kate Powell, cousin and adopted daughter of the Templeton family.Kate is smart, focused, totally goal-orientated and practical and nothing like the beautiful and glamorous Margo, who we met in Daring to Dream, now happily married to Josh and expecting their baby and not a dreamer like the sweet Laura, who finally divorced her cheating and thief of a husband and struggling with bringing up her two beautiful daughters.Kate’s work is her life – neat, tidy, organized - and is looking forward to her promotion in the auditing company she works for. So who cares that she forgets to eat or that she eats Tums like …a lot of them. It’s all part of her dream. Making the family proud of her accomplishments.Finding out the truth about her dead parents and accused of embezzling her clients, suddenly finds her world crashing around her.Trying to deal with all the fall-outs, she begins working at the boutique that she’s a partner with Margo and Laura, and soon driving them crazy with her “management” style of the store. I loved the interaction and banter between the three. You feel the love and loyalty between them as strongly as they weather yet another obstacle in their lives.Byron de Witt, sexy gorgeous and fabulous, is now working for the Templeton’s looking after their hotels in California. Kate is certainly not the kind of women he’s attracted to and he’s certainly not her favorite guy either – how can anyone trust a man who looks like him!!!!Byron finds himself unexpectedly attracted to the prickly Kate…and being a loyal and honorable man he’s soon doing everything to help her clear and name and at the same time helping her in other ways…her health and of course her love life!!!!She slowly begins opening up to Byron and I was laughing my head off here….she’s totally into him but no way will she give up her control in the relationship….and when he tells her he loves her!!!!!!!! I was rolling on the floor!!! I did that a lot in this story…….. I loved her transformation from “no boobs” to the secrets of push-up bras and wearing sexy clothes and having fab biceps. Running on the beach!!! [image error]
Overall - an ok book... However, I liked it much, much less than the first one. Even though Margo (heroine from the first book) was selfish and annoying at times - I liked her much more than Kate. Kate seemed like a TSTL (too-stupid-to-live) heroine, that kept "cutting off her nose to spite her face". She constantly made bad choices and said stupid things, while trying to prove herself! All she ended up proving was that she was neurotic, self-centered, and undeserving of an amazing guy such as Byron! Kate's anorexic tendencies got really annoying... She never seemed to eat anything or want to eat anything... she eyed food with disgust... Then when she got seriously sick - she kept ignoring all the symptoms! I understand that there was that hospital trauma (that was kind of glossed-over), but had she acted like a normal, responsible adult, it needn't have come to her having to be rushed to the ER. Her breaking things off with Byron was absolutely ridiculous! She was angry that he "played her" by being a nice guy, doing everything right and making her fall in love with him!? Since when did being a nice guy and a perfect gentleman become a bad thing??? Anyways, she refuses to marry him because "you didn't marry someone you didn't know even a full year...maybe, just maybe, after two years, after you've worked out the kinks in the relationship you began to discuss the possibility of a marriage. You had to outline what you wanted, assigned the roles and the duties, who handled the marketing (??), who paid the bills, who took out the trash...And what about the children?! ... What about assignment of responsibility?? Diapers and laundry? Doctors' appointments? If you didn't nail down the details of responsibilities you had nothing but chaos..." She sounds like a demented lunatic!!! Am I to believe that a normal person thinks and talks like this?! She's a freakin' robot! So yeah - while i liked the book overall - Kate was one of the most annoying female characters EVER! If I were Byron, I would have had her committed!
What do You think about Holding The Dream (2006)?
Nora Roberts did not disappoint in this next installment of the dream trilogy Kate has that type A personality that drives some people crazy. She is all work and no play and is making herself sick by worrying so much. Kate has just found out some some disturbing about her father which now had her even more upset. Just when she thought things could not get worse Kate gets accused of one of the worst things she can be accused of in her line of work. Then along the way comes a white knight to help save her day. Kate does not know how to handle this. Kate faces a new journey in her life and learns to love for the first time. I loved Byron and how he handled Kate and learned how to make her happy. There were times when Kate would drive me crazy at times and then there were times I felt sorry for her. I loved the relationship that Margo, Laura and Kate have with each other. They have such a close bond that you don't see often enough. You will also find a surprise with Josh and Margo in this book. I am looking forward to reading the last book in this trilogy. I give this book 5 stars - this is a must read series.
—Angela Lynn Holland
3.5 stars again.I liked this a lot, but at the same time I wanted to like the romance more than I did. I don't know why I didn't. I am having a weird week on pretty much every level.Some comments:-Southern boy named Byron would have made even more sense if he were Byron something something the third.-Of course his dogs' names are Nip and Tuck. My brother used to name all of his stuffed animals after medicine. The original was Motrin. My other favorite was Zithromax. (He was not yet five years old when he named either of those stuffed dogs.)-The only thing more obvious than the fact that Thornhill was the embezzler was the fact that Kate had an ulcer.-I enjoyed seeing how well things are going for Josh and Margo (and now the baby)!-This book was published in 1997. The Yankees-Braves thing would have been a pretty big deal then. (I remember *begging* my parents to let me stay up for the '96 World Series.)-Please tell me Peter Ridgeway gets his due? Preferably Candy also. THESE ARE ROMANCE NOVELS. THESE THINGS ARE SUPPOSED TO WORK OUT.And now I am going to bed.
—Grace
Orphaned at the age of eight, Kate Powell was raised by the Templetons, and has vowed never to disappoint them. She's sharp, smart, a gamine woman with a head for figures.But her world is turned upside down when a secret from her late father's past comes to light and then she's accused of embezzling from the accounting firm she works for. To top it off, she's got Byron DeWitt, a new executive working for Templeton, breathing down her neck.Determined to ignore her problems, Kate throws herself into work at Pretenses, but it doesn't work quite the way she hopes. With the police wanting to question her, her friends trying to mother her, and Byron wanting to take care of her, Kate can't find a moments peace.In order to get her life back on track, she'll have to face her demons - and open her heart.
—Aline
