It Happened One Night
by Lisa Dale.

Grand Central paperback, 350 pages. 2009.
Contemporary. Vermont.

she doesn't want to lose her best friend.

"'What are you thinking?' he asked. 

She looked at him and smiled. The breath she took was so deep her shoulders lifted and fell. He thought of running his fingers over her collarbones, their marble curves. And for once, he didn't banish the thought from his mind. 

'I'm just thinking that I'm glad we're here. That it helps,' she said. 

He knew he shouldn't but he let his gaze trail down the front of her sundress, over the gentle swell of her breasts, the firmness of her rib cage, and then the slight mound of her belly. She shifted and the white cotton of her sundress whispered against her skin. 

'I don't understand it,' she said. 'But when I'm with you, it's like my head clears.' 

He had to look away. When he'd first started studying the sky, he naively put his eye up to a telescope and marveled for long minutes at the moon's stark landscape. It felt like his whole eye, his whole head. had filled up by the bigness of the moon. And when at last he pulled away from the lens he realized that he couldn't see that he'd gone momentarily blind in one eye because of all that huge and overwhelming light. That was now he felt now - she was more than  he could stand. 

'What is it that you want?' he asked. The harshness of his voice surprised him. And it must have caught her by surprise as well. She turned her head, and because of where they sat shoulder to shoulder, swinging gently on the love seat, her lips were suddenly, excruciatingly close to his. He couldn't help it; he turned toward her. 'Lana. Tell me what you want. What you really want.'"

Best friends since college, ten years later Lana Biel and Eli Ward remain close. But Eli has always wanted more. He's just been afraid of losing what he has if he speaks out. Lana gets pregnant by this guy she brought home one night and Eli finds a girlfriend and they become serious - altho he's really fooling himself. More and more Lana tries not to think of a deeper feeling for Eli and things start to get tense.  

Meanwhile, Lana is thinking of giving up her baby for adoption and why not let her sister adopt her baby? After all, her sister Karin and husband have wanted a child for so long and Lana doesn't think she would be a good parent. Besides, she has always dreamed of traveling. Both she and her sister had a father who didn't care and they pretty much raised themselves. Furthermore, the natural father of this baby says he's not interested and not even convinced the child is his. But there's Eli and he would gladly marry Lana and be a  father for this baby. Then Lana and Karin's father comes to town and asks for help.

Altho this is a heartwarming, sweet story, it does have it's problems. I couldn't buy the father's turnaround nor Ron's change. It drags in places where the story seems to repeat itself with their relationship. And anyone could have told them that going out in bad weather when she was precariously pregnant was not a good idea. However, having said that, this has many fine moments and is a warm and tender story of love. It gets rather bold in places and also rather dramatic in others. Good reading.

  Back to Reviews