Book Review: The Encounter

Author: Ruth McCarthy Sears
Title: The Encounter
Publisher: Dell: Candlelight Romance 175
Publish Date: July 1975
Rating: 3 Stars

Ruth McCarthy Sears' The Encounter was written in 1975, and the world of romance and of women in romance was totally different then. The heroine Mara Belcourt has never gotten over her teenage crush on Richard Tudor, to the point where she's ruined for all other men, and she has several chasing after her.

Mara was given money to travel by her aunt Roz and she heads to Switzerland where she encounters and old friend (Kane Sheraton) and has a nasty encounter (someone tries to kill her). When she returns to the states, she sees her old crush and her heartstrings are tugged, even though she has the eye of Air Force Captain Andy Mann, who will be stationed near her home in Colorado.

Once home the intrigue that started continues, when Richard arrives, but he's not the same.

For a book from the 70s its actually pretty progressive in its subject matter. There's lots of talk of drug trafficking. The thing that bugs me about books in this time frame are the occupations the women have; nurses or librarians. Wow not even a token kindergarten teacher!

Mara comes across as shallow, what with her having a passel of guys after her, yet you really can't dislike her. Why? Because she's got that hope that she will win the affections of her crush only to spurn him in the end. Don't we all wish we could do that just once?

The twists and turns are really unbelievable, from a twin that was supposed to have been dead, but is back and involved in drugs to the two guys that stick around even though Mara really doesn't seem interested. How she ends up engaged to one of them at the end is really still a mystery to me, yet these 128 were quite engaging and fun, mostly because of how different category romances are written now.