Single mom Danalee Jackson owns the Blue Note—a successful Alaskan jazz bar. She also manages a failing float-plane business while raising her son. When the bar is flagged for code violations, Dana is certain she has no time for romance.
Burned-out after finishing his father’s legacy project—the multimillion-dollar Grove Marketplace—Mark Moretti is ready for a summer-long fishing trip. But a canceled flight stranded him in Ketchikan, where he lands at the Blue Note.
One look at the exotically beautiful Dana and Mark offers to do the construction work required to clear the code violations. Mutual attraction sparks into flame, but Dana’s fierce independence threatens to bring everything to a screeching halt.
Previously titled: All That You Are
“Fans who have followed the escapades of the older Moretti brothers in All The Right Angles and All That Matters will enjoy meeting wild-child Mark, age 40 and facing a midlife crisis. While spending the summer in Ketchikan, Alaska, he’s thrown out of the Blue Note bar and into love with its beautiful proprietor, Danalee Jackson, a part-black, part-Chinese 28-year-old with a murky history, a young son and a policy against dating customers. When the Blue Note is cited for building violations, financially strapped Dana accepts Mark’s offer of help, and their relationship unfolds through verbal jabs that turn gradually into conversations . . . Holm’s affection for her characters and the beautiful setting lend a hint of savor to this sweet souffle. (Oct.)”
Publisher’s Weekly
Reader Rating: * * * * *
“In Ketchikan, Alaska single mom Danalee Jackson runs her late father’s jazz club, the Blue Note. She is lonely and struggling to balance managing the bar and raising her son, but loves living in this gateway city to the final American frontier. With the death of his father, Mark Moretti finished their last job alone in honor of his dad. However after completing the downtown Boise project, he never had time to grieve his loss. Feeling a desperate need to get away, Mark goes off on a summer long fishing trip with no end in mind. In Ketchikan, Mark meets Danalee and her young son, who take away the blue feelings even as he goes back to work renovating her bar to meet the code. The location and the eccentric Blue Note patrons add depth to an enjoyable relatively simplistic contemporary romance of two lonely people falling in love. The lead couple and her son are fully developed protagonists and the audience will want the best for each of them, but the city and its surrounding area steals the show as Stef Ann Holm vividly paints the landscape.”
-Harriet Klausner
-www.barnesandnoble.com
