Product Description

#1 New York Times-bestselling author Nora Roberts takes us deep into the rugged Black Hills of South Dakota, where the shadows keep secrets, hunters stalk the land, and a childhood friendship matures into an adult passion.

Asummer at his grandparents' South Dakota ranch is not eleven-year-old Cooper Sullivan's idea of a good time. But things are a bit more bearable now that he's discovered the neighbor girl, Lil Chance, and her homemade batting cage. Even horseback riding isn't as awful as Coop thought it would be. Each year, with Coop's annual summer visit, their friendship deepens from innocent games to stolen kisses, but there is one shared experience that will forever haunt them: the terrifying discovery of a hiker's body.

As the seasons change and the years roll, Lil stays steadfast to her dreams of becoming a wildlife biologist and protecting her family land, while Coop struggles with his father's demand that he attend law school and join the family firm. Twelve years after they last walked together hand in hand, fate has brought them back to the Black Hills when the people and things they hold most dear need them most.

An investigator in New York, Coop recently left his fastpaced life to care for his aging grandparents and the ranch he has come to call home. Though the memory of his touch still haunts her, Lil has let nothing stop her dream of opening the Chance Wildlife Refuge, but something . . . or someone . . . has been keeping a close watch. When small pranks and acts of destruction escalate into the heartless killing of Lil's beloved cougar, recollections of an unsolved murder in these very hills have Coop springing to action to keep Lil safe.

Lil and Coop both know the natural dangers that lurk in the wild landscape of the Black Hills. But now they must work together to unearth a killer of twisted and unnatural instincts who has singled them out as prey.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2814 in Books
• Published on: 2009-07-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 480 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780399155819
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

From Publishers Weekly
It's not just a sure-fire formula that's kept the crown atop the queen of romance, as this thriller proves. The gushy love-conquers-all story of South Dakota wildlife biologist Lil Chance and ex-cop/PI Coop Sullivan takes a back seat to the taut, gritty chase of a serial killer. There's never a doubt that Lil and Coop—childhood sweethearts who fall in love, drift apart and then reconnect—will help each other mend their wounded hearts: It was a good day, she thought, when you opened yourself to both the joys and the risks of love, Lil discovers. Nor is it surprising that a crazed killer will meet his match in feisty Lil. But this premier storyteller proves an ordinary love story can still win your heart, and even an inevitable confrontation may scare you silly. (July)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From The Washington Post
From The Washington Post's Book World/washingtonpost.com Reviewed by Maureen Corrigan It doesn't much matter what I say about this new Nora Roberts novel; most of the adult female population of the planet is going to read it anyway. It's a staggering understatement to say that Roberts is review-proof. There are more than 300 million copies of her books in print, and she's written 160 bestsellers, 39 of which have debuted at No. 1. So let's step away from Roberts and her books for a moment and, instead, consider me. I'm the fall guy here -- the stooge who's been assigned to review "Black Hills" -- and whatever I say about Roberts is going to affect me a heck of a lot more than it's going to affect her. If I pan the novel, I come off as a snooty-pants literature professor, and I'll be deluged by e-mails from her ticked-off fans. If I gush over it, I'll be suspected of trying too hard to be just a regular gal, a self-conscious populist, like Sen. John Kerry on the campaign trail back in 2004, ordering a better class of cheese on his Philly cheese steak. So here I am, caught between a rock and a hard place. Roberts's feisty heroines are often stuck in this kind of fix at the climax of her tales just before a deus ex machina in the form of Mother Nature or a hunky guy drops in to rescue them. That's why women read Nora Roberts: to live out vicariously the fantasies that real life doesn't provide. Well, I'm going to live out a personal fantasy for a moment and pretend that it's still the Golden Age of Critics: Mencken, Parker, Woollcott, Wilson -- witty gatekeepers of culture who said what they thought without fear of the backlash of the booboisie or the demagogy of the Internet. I'm going to say what I think straight out: "Black Hills" is synthetic mind candy. It's not even very satisfying synthetic mind candy, like, for instance, Clive Cussler in his prime or Patricia Wentworth's soothing Maud Silver mysteries. Roberts could probably do better than a novel that, chapter by chapter, feeds her readers the top 100 female fantasies: (1) a rock-'em/sock-'em romantic partner who also takes out the garbage the minute he's asked; (2) a French lover; (3) lustrous hair that keeps its shape even when a serial killer is looking to scalp its owner; (4) a rollicking shopping spree with the girls, followed by a spa day the following week; (5) a fierce wild animal (in this case, a cougar) that, inexplicably, forms a loving bond with the heroine. Need I continue? In addition to cougars, there are horses, a tiger, hapless hikers and a serial killer on the loose in this latest bodice-ripper. Because that's essentially what Roberts writes: romances with a soft patina of suspense. This latest smooch-and-shoot saga spans three decades and many twists of the heart. It begins in 1989 when 11-year-old Cooper Sullivan is dispatched from his home in New York City by his rich, divorcing parents to spend the summer in South Dakota with his salt-of-the-earth maternal grandparents. Down on the farm, Cooper is bored by what Karl Marx called "the idiocy of rural life" until he meets a tomboy named Lil Chance who pitches a mean fastball. Cooper returns every summer until, nine years into this ritual, he and Lil decide it's time to play a more serious game than baseball. Camping together out in the wild, they mate like glorious young bobcats. ("You're like . . . gold dust all over," pants Cooper adoringly when he undresses Lil for the first time.) Their Edenic camp-out ends abruptly when, on a lover's ramble amid the wildflowers, the pair discover a young woman's corpse. It seems that the beginning of their love affair has coincided with the beginning of a serial killer's career. Shortly thereafter, Cooper inexplicably dumps Lil by telling her he needs to prove his manhood to himself, or some such rot. He becomes a New York cop while she sets out to build the wildlife refuge she's always dreamed of. Years pass, and Cooper returns to South Dakota to care for his ailing grandfather. He and Lil circle round each other for about half a second before they're tussling in the sack again, this time at her cozy cabin in the wildlife refuge. Roberts describes their coupling thusly: "Outside one of the cats called out, a wild thing prowling the dark. He took her there, into the dark, and what was wild in her cried out, released in harsh and primitive pleasure." The big cat, however, isn't the only thing prowling in the dark: That pesky serial killer is still around, and he's had Lil in his sights for a long time. To give Roberts her due, she keeps this fluff aloft for hundreds of pages (partly by repeating the same sex scene every other chapter or so). "Black Hills" isn't much of a suspense story, and the romance is so silly that it isn't even good fantasy fodder, but none of Roberts's fans will give a hoot. For beyond any of the fantasies her individual novels heat up and serve, it's the tale of Roberts herself -- her transformation from an average mom to a Dickensian lean-and-mean writing machine who maintains her down-to-earth, saucy persona in the face of stupendous success -- that offers the most satisfying fantasy of all. That's a tale that Roberts fans, as well as her critics, can agree to applaud.
Copyright 2009, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

About the Author
Nora Roberts is the number-one New York Times- bestselling author of more than 150 novels, including Tribute, High Noon, Angels Fall, Blue Smoke, Northern Lights, and many more. She is also the author of the bestselling futuristic suspense series written under the pen name J. D. Robb. Roberts has more than 280 million copies of her books in print.

Customer Reviews

Have your ticket ready
The Queen of suspense-filled romance novels once again treats her loyal fans to a thrill ride of intrigue that twists and turns through the Black Hills of South Dakota. As expected, this ride has well-defined backdrops, with all the sights, sounds, and smells, culminating to give the reader an experience of a life time. Enough with the standing in line...let's get to it. When Lillian Chance was a teenager, a chance meeting would introduce her to a young man named Cooper Sullivan. During a dinner between Cooper's grandparents and the Chance family, the two would form a bond that spans a lifetime. Years later, both would go on and pursue their dreams. Lil Chance is a world-renowned biologist that specializes in big cats and founded the Chance Wildlife Reserve in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Cooper Sullivan is a cop that also works security. That is, until a colleague of his is murdered. Coop, has finally had enough and returns to the small town in which he grew up.


Hold on tight, 'cause here comes the drop. Just as Coop returns home, he discovers a murderer lurking within the town, and with each new murder getting closer to Lillian, his feelings toward her grow deeper and deeper. Will he be able to protect her? Will the love they once shared be rekindled? Lil still has bitter feelings toward Coop, can she put them aside? I could tell you, but what fun would that be? Nora Roberts has an uncanny ability to build suspense and she does just that in her newest novel. This is a romance, however, and unlike rollercoasters that whip the reader around at breakneck speeds, Black Hills allows the reader to enjoy every aspect of the ride. Nora Roberts has put great detail and research into the backdrops and this ride is more reminiscent of a themed-coaster and not an old-fashion raise your hands and scream-coaster. That is Nora's style: depth, quality, and substance......I would also highly recommend JoAnna Wylde's novel: Price of Pleasure-- Price of Pleasure an excellent, supenseful novel.

eerily reminiscent of Montana Sky, not her best work.
I must admit that I usually buy most of Nora's books used because I love her books so much that I would spend a fortune buying new. This time I caved in and bought the hardcover for $18 a Wal Mart and was somewhat disappointed.

Almost immediately after starting the book, I had a strange sense of Deja Vu. The problem with having written close to 200 novels is that even the best writer will eventually run out of new material. Right off I saw numerous similarities to her book Montana Sky. How many times can you write a story about a crazy person who leaves dead animals on someone's doorstep? I did get a sense that the romantic conflict was drawn out, and since the reader discovers rather early on in this book who the person is doing the evil deeds, suspense gives way to the sense that Nora is trying to draw the story out as long as possible and it becomes rather old.

This is one of Nora's titles that I would check out at the library or buy in paperback because it's not worth the price of the hardcover.

awesome book
I had been disappointeed in the last couple of NR books i had read but this one really grabbed my attention. Not only am I a fan of NR but I'm a huge animal lover. I loved all the detail and even gained some knnowledge of the cougar. NR has redeemed herself. keep 'em coming!