30 Days of Books - Days 26 and 27

A Book That Changed Your Opinion About Something

I tried, I really did, to come up with a book for day 26.  But I've got nothing, even though I procrastinated and waited a day before posting.  My luck, I will  immediately think of a book in another day or two.

The Most Surprising Plot Twist Or Ending

When I first started the 30 days of books, I looked over the list to try and plan what books I would talk about.  For today, Sandra Brown's Where There's Smoke immediately came to mind.  I first read this book when I was about twenty.  I remember being stunned (jaw-dropping and gasping) by two plot twists in this book.  I'm not sure if it was because I was just starting to get into contemporary romance and didn't see it coming, or if I was too naive.  But, over 15 years later I still enjoy reading this book and think it holds up well.  It has the feel of an epic novel because it does not just focus on the hero and heroine, but a cast of characters living in the same town.

No one knows why Dr. Lara Mallory came back home to Eden Pass, Texas to open up her medical practice after all these years. But everyone remembers her role in the well-publicized scandal that caused the downfall of White House hopeful Senator Clark Tackett. So when the iron-fisted matriarch of Tackett Oil uses every weapon in her arsenal to drive her out of town, Lara refuses to go quietly. Yet in this corruption-riddled town, nothing is as it seems. An explosive secret lurks beneath the surface, threatening Lara at every turn. Her unlikely ally: Key, the hell-raising youngest Tackett son. Thrown together, they're on a dangerous quest to expose the one secret that can destroy the Tackett empire-and anyone who dares to challenge its power.

If you love melodramatic books featuring family empires, secrets, and ill-fated love, you will love this book!  Spoiler alert - below I have written the two plot twists that completely took me by surprise.  Highlight the words to read them.

After Lara is accused to having an affair with Clark Tackett, she and her husband, Randall, are banished to the Carribean nation of Montesangre.  There, the ambassador Randal and their daughter are murdered.  A couple of years later, Lara ends up in Eden Pass with one mission - to get Key to fly her back to Montesangre for her daughter's body.  The first plot twist is that Randall is not dead but has been living in Montesangre all these years.  The second twist is that it wasn't Lara who was having an affair with Clark, but Randall.