Clay

May 28, 2001
Blake draws a powerful portrait of a mother who will risk everything, including imprisonment, to save her eight-year-old daughter's life in the fourth installment of her Louisiana Gentlemen series (after Roan). Janna Kerr's daughter, Lainey, has end-stage renal disease and will die if she doesn't receive a kidney transplant. In desperation, Janna turns to a doctor who deals in black-market human organs and moves Lainey to a secluded fishing camp owned by her friend, Denise, a member of the Benedict clan of Turn-Coupe, La., to await the shady doctor's summons. A short while later, Clay Benedict shows up at Janna's door to check on the new guests. Janna, for reasons never made entirely clear to the reader, drugs Clay and ties him to the bed. It doesn't take long for Clay to realize that Lainey is his deceased twin brother's child or to fall in love with his adorable niece and her mother. When two teenaged boys are found murdered, their vital organs harvested, Janna begins to understand the price that she has agreed to pay for her daughter's life. At times, this poignant tale treads the fine line between drama and melodrama, but the lush setting of the Louisiana marshlands and Blake's vivid prose will send newcomers back to the shelves to pick up the first three books of the series.

April 15, 2013

Clay Benedict has no idea why a beautiful woman living in the bayou would drug him and then hold him prisoner. Yet when he looks into the eyes of her desperately ill young daughter and makes the connection, he knows he will do anything it takes to keep them both safe. A strong sense of family, sultry Southern charm, and an underlying sense of menace permeate this atmospheric story that is classic contemporary Blake and part of a five-book series that was first published by Mira in 2001.

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