The target audience is LDS female from teen to adult. It is a fictional romantic fantasy.

Two people, Alex Keane and Jane Layton, are paired as dance partners for a competition. They fall head over high heels in love and after one week of dance practice go out on a breakfast date to discuss their lives and the future. Jane lets Alex know that she will settle for nothing less then a temple marriage and finds out that Alex is a member but not active. Alex is a med school graduate working on his internship in the emergency room at the local hospital and Jane is working on a teaching degree. We don't know what city they are living in but we do know that it isn't in California or Utah so it could be anywhere.

We learn that Alex has two goals in his life besides getting his medical degree. He wants a large home and a black Ferrari. He has pictures of these taped to the mirror in his apartment to help keep him focused on his goals. Jane tapes a picture of a temple on the mirror to help him focus on that goal too. Alex does promise to give up the little social drinking that he has been doing but that is as much as he is willing to do toward becoming active. He has nothing to do with his father who left when Alex was 13 but has a loving relationship with his mother who is an active church member living in Salt Lake.

Three months later Alex leaves for Michigan to do his residency at a busy hospital where he will get lots of good ER experience due to the high crime rate there. Alex and Jane continue their relationship long distance. Four years later we find them in Salt Lake City where Jane has a teaching job and Alex is working at the University of Utah Medical Center Emergency Room. Amazingly Alex has a new black Ferrari and he is only at the start of his practice. Together Alex and Jane have purchased a home that Jane is living in but Alex keeps most of his things there and only goes to his apartment to sleep. He visits his mother everyday on his way to Jane's after work.

One day at work Alex is devastated when his mother is wheeled in on a stretcher after having a heart attack and is DOA. He takes time off to deal with the funeral. Once back at work he and Jane are invited to a get together at a home where alcohol is served. Alex gets drunk and Jane insists on driving home. They are arguing and the car is hit when a truck runs a stop sign. Jane is critically injured and Alex only mildly. Jane is in a coma that lasts 10 weeks. Meanwhile Alex gets his life in order by going back to church and getting a temple recommend.

When Jane comes out of the coma she suddenly wants to get out of bed and into a wheel chair because she is tired of being in the bed for so long. Excuse me, but does a coma patient know that they are in a bed for any length of time? The nurse obligingly helps her into a wheel chair and into the bathroom where Jane brushes her teeth and cleans herself up. Huh? When she is wheeled out of the bathroom Alex is there to see her and he proposes all over again. If Jane had it her way they would be married that afternoon.

I am sorry but this whole part of the book is awful. First of all when a person is coming out of a coma it takes a while for it to happen. They don't just suddenly open their eyes and become wide awake. Plus no nurse would dare do anything without a doctor's approval especially not something like putting Jane in a wheel chair before the doctor has a chance to check her out. And the story is so full of details but forgets to mention that some of the things that Jane is hooked up to are catheters that would have to be removed before she ever gets out of bed. Ouch!

Not to mention a feeding tube going into her nose. Pretty hard to brush teeth with that in the way. Where does Ms. Stansfield do her research? One can only assume that she gets her information from watching soap operas. Now do you see where the fantasy comes in?

Of course the book ends in a fairytale way by everything working out. Alex gets together with his father and he and Jane are married in the temple. They go on to live happily ever after or maybe not because there is a sequel that I just can't wait to read and write another book review about. Or can I?

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M. McQuarrie
March 20, 2006