You Only Love Twice by Lori Wilde

I've really been on a roll with good books. This one isn't out until March 2006, but a bit of buzz can't hurt. *g*

Back cover blurb:

COMIC-BOOK HEROINE ANGELINA AVENGER battles dastardly criminals and alien invasions. But her creator Marlie Montague's life isn't as exciting...until Marlie opens the front door and finds the business end of a pistol pointed right at her. Her plan: to channel Angelina fast! Recruiting her new next-door neighbor, who looks like a rock-hard action hero, couldn't hurt either...

The last thing Navy secret agent Joel Hunter expected on this surveillance gig was a luscious brunette bursting through his window. Now he and Marlie are blowing the doors off a full-blown conspiracy with more double agents than a Bond flick. But in between shootouts and squealing tires, the mystery that is Marlie is making Joel's heart go thump thump thump. is she a femme fatale or an endearing bookworm? And how does she leave him both shaken and stirred?

The Bond references are very apt here. You Only Love Twice reads like a great action movie where things are rocketing along. You don't care that you don't get a chance to stop and breathe and think because it's such a wildly fun ride that it doesn't matter. Lori Wilde's written a seriously fun spy/conspiracy theory romp here that I ended up reading in a matter of hours.

Marlie's creates a conspiracy theory-based comic with a kick-ass heroine named Angelina. It's obvious Angelina's another side of Marlie, perhaps the assertive, carefree woman that Marlie wishes she was. Having her father accused of being a traitor to his country and being killed has tainted Marlie's opinion on the government and is the reason she writes about conspiracy theories and other things that go bump in the night. Don't worry, she isn't a kook, just has a healthy sense of skepticism.

Joel...he's not happy about having to do surveillance on her. He's pretty sure there's no way she's a threat to national security, she just writes comic books with a rather anti-government bent. She's also the daughter of the man his father killed and they once knew each other as children (but she was very young and doesn't recognize him now). He finds himself interested by the woman he knows is hiding behind the black and white of her life. And well, when she breaks into his house escaping from an assassin, it starts off a crazy chain of events that has both of them set up for murder and other things and on the run from the authorities! I loved it.

I wouldn't call this a romantic suspense even though the hero is a former Navy Seal and now a secret agent and the plot involves a government conspiracy. It's more of a action/adventure romance. And there is romance here. Marlie and Joel have some great chemistry, but also start to like each other just for who they are. Joel isn't as fleshed out as Marlie, but I still liked him. His ex-wife is also a character and I was impressed with how Lori Wilde portrayed her. It's definitely not the norm. I especially loved the end. It was sweet and cute and definitely an "ahhhh" moment.

So...in March, you're going to go get the book, right? Or at least think about it. Remember, You Only Love Twice by Lori Wilde.