Bitter Harvest (Beeler)

Rating:
Summary: Exiting romantic suspense
Review: In Winnipeg, Michelle Tyler is extremely unhappy with her spouse, JNN international correspondent Brian Norton because he is going overseas on assignment during Thanksgiving. Michelle wants Brian to stay home more so they can start a family, but he relishes these jobs.

When a letter arrives from her seventy-eight-year-old estranged grandmother Eleanor, who asks Michelle to visit her in New Brunswick, she decides to finally meet her deceased mother's family. Michelle soon learns that all is not right at her grandmother's home. Eleanor believes one or more of her hanger-on children or their spouses is trying to harm her. The family believes Eleanor's mind is slipping, but Michelle thinks otherwise and that an unknown assailant is setting the elderly woman up to look senile. Feeling protective, Michelle decides to keep her relative safe even at the risk to herself.

BITTER HARVEST is an exciting Canadian romantic suspense that works because the charcaters seem authentic, especially their interactions with each other. The story line starts slowly as a simmer but then builds into a potboiler. The plot belongs to Michelle and Eleanor, but by their actions the secondary cast makes the tale succeed. Susan Bowden provides her fans with a deep soul-crunching novel that will garner her new recruits.

Harriet Klausner