REVIEW
Christmas in Dogtown
by Suzanne
Johnson
Christmas in Dogtown is currently on tour with Bewitching Book Tours.
the tour stops here today for my review. Be sure to visit the other tour stops as well.
Description
A woman who spent
years escaping her rural past learns that Dogtown, Louisiana, hides more family
secrets than just the recipe for boudin blanc ...
Resa Madere’s on the
verge of losing it all. The boyfriend’s gone. The job’s history. Her beloved
house is on the brink of foreclosure. She’ll do anything to save it - even spend
a long Christmas holiday working in St. James Parish, Louisiana, helping her
uncle run the family meat business. But the community of Dogtown, which has
been home for seven generations of the Madere and Caillou families, has deep
roots and deeper secrets. For Resa, going home is one thing.
Getting out might
not be so easy.
Excerpt
“You are stupid,” Resa told her reflection in the tiny, scratched mirror
of the White Castle’s rose-pink bathroom. “Stupid, ridiculous, and absurd.”
She’d been wrestling with her curly black hair for a half hour, and the
brown eyes that stared back at her from beneath freshly plucked brows and
carefully applied eyeliner looked more jittery than sexy. “And idiotic.”
First, it had been almost a week since Chan had asked her to the Saturday
night community dance, popping the question almost shyly as they hacked at the
bodies of gigantic dead fish. They’d both been covered in blood and smelled
like they’d been rolling in bait, which should have tipped her off that
anything in Dogtown reeking of romance, well, reeked.
Second, her potential date had left immediately after asking her out so
he could catch an alligator that had eaten somebody’s poodle in one of those
backwater houses near the swamp. He burned rubber out of the Madere’s driveway
after making sure he had enough duct tape to wrap around the gator’s jaws.
Adequate duct tape was not an attribute she’d ever sought in a man.
Review
By Lynda Dickson
Resa (Teresa) Madere
has recently been dumped by her husband and is struggling to pay her mortgage.
She heads home to Dogtown just before Christmas to help her Uncle Emile in the
family sausage-making business. Dogtown is a small town whose residents belong
to either the Madere or Caillou families. Its major attraction is the strange dog-like
mascot, the rougarou, located in the center of town. Resa's sentiments about
her home town can be summed up as follows: "Dogtown was like quicksand;
unless one kept moving, getting stuck was inevitable, followed by sinking and
suffocation."
Coincidentally, Resa's
old school friend Chan (Chandler) Caillou has just moved back to Dogtown to
take over his family's alligator wrangling business. He states, "It was my
responsibility, you know? Sometimes we're born into a situation and we have to
decide if we're gonna be a part of it or if we're gonna put an end to it."
According to both their families, Resa and Chan are destined to be married. Resa
has never felt that way about Chan, but now that he's all grown up, she's not
so sure. When Chan asks Resa out to the community dance, the town's tongues start
wagging.
What secret are both
families hiding and how does it affect Resa and Chan? The future of both
families is in her hands, and Resa has a decision to make.
This is a magical
tale not so much about Christmas but about love, family, and new beginnings. A
nice quick holiday read.
About the Author
Suzanne Johnson writes urban fantasy and paranormal romance (under the
name Susannah Sandlin) from Auburn, Alabama, on top of a career in educational publishing
that has thus far spanned five states and six universities - including both
Alabama and Auburn, which makes her bilingual. She grew up in Winfield,
Alabama, halfway between the Bear Bryant Museum and Elvis' birthplace, but was
also a long-time resident of New Orleans, so she has a highly refined sense of
the absurd and an ingrained love of SEC football, cheap Mardi Gras trinkets,
and fried gator on a stick. She’s the author of the Sentinels of New Orleans urban fantasy series and, as Susannah Sandlin, the Penton Vampire Legacy paranormal romance series.
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