The Pickle Queen

I have loved Deborah Smith from the time she was a Loveswept romance author in the 1980s through her hardcover mainstream publisher glory days to her fine novels released through her Belle Books publishing company. But I have to admit that this novella format is not turning out to be her best friend. She is trying to cram too much into too few pages and something is lost in the process. I was looking forward to the childhood friends-turned-enemies love story between Gabby and Jay ever since they were introduced in The Biscuit Witch, but I felt like their story was shortchanged in favor of introducing numerous colorful secondary characters. The reader doesn't get to see enough of the two of them together, so the impact of their reunion and realization of their true feelings is muted. An extra hundred pages of development would have been welcomed.

I will still be first in line to get the last book in this trilogy.