The Healer (Deep in the Heart)

Rating:
Summary: engaging thought provoking romance
Review: At Mercy Hospital in Dallas, Caroline Malone is the finest surgeon because she always does her best for her patients and expects nothing less from the team. Escaping her beloved work for a needed rest, Caroline rides her steed Star King. However a jackrabbit spooks her horse leading to Caroline injuring her hand and unable to perform cardiac surgery. A depressed Caroline leaves Dallas for the West Texas Davis Mountain to begin what she hopes is the healing process.

In Davis Mountain, Diego Montalvo battles with demons from his military medic days by providing homeopathic treatments to those in need. When Diego and Caroline meet, the clash is between modern medical science and local healing arts, but underneath is a growing love for one another. Diego wonders how he will survive the loss of Caroline when he heals her hand and she returns to Dallas. Caroline wonders how her heart will recover once he heals her hand and she returns to Dallas.

THE HEALER is an engaging thought provoking romance that enables the audience to see the best and somewhat the worst of two approaches to healing. The ploy succeeds because the audience believes that Caroline and Diego have no doubts that their way is the best way even while they debate the merits of both methods. Thus the growing love between them becomes a joy and an albatross, but sheer pleasure for the audience. Readers will seek the first novel in "Deep in the Heart" series, WHAT THE HEART WANTS (starring Caroline's sister Ivy) and anxiously wait missing sibling Chloe's story.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: engaging thought provoking romance
Review: At Mercy Hospital in Dallas, Caroline Malone is the finest surgeon because she always does her best for her patients and expects nothing less from the team. Escaping her beloved work for a needed rest, Caroline rides her steed Star King. However a jackrabbit spooks her horse leading to Caroline injuring her hand and unable to perform cardiac surgery. A depressed Caroline leaves Dallas for the West Texas Davis Mountain to begin what she hopes is the healing process.

In Davis Mountain, Diego Montalvo battles with demons from his military medic days by providing homeopathic treatments to those in need. When Diego and Caroline meet, the clash is between modern medical science and local healing arts, but underneath is a growing love for one another. Diego wonders how he will survive the loss of Caroline when he heals her hand and she returns to Dallas. Caroline wonders how her heart will recover once he heals her hand and she returns to Dallas.

THE HEALER is an engaging thought provoking romance that enables the audience to see the best and somewhat the worst of two approaches to healing. The ploy succeeds because the audience believes that Caroline and Diego have no doubts that their way is the best way even while they debate the merits of both methods. Thus the growing love between them becomes a joy and an albatross, but sheer pleasure for the audience. Readers will seek the first novel in "Deep in the Heart" series, WHAT THE HEART WANTS (starring Caroline's sister Ivy) and anxiously wait missing sibling Chloe's story.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: Destiny and transformation -- Very highly recommended
Review: Staff at Mercy Hospital calls her Miracle Malone until a riding accident destroys the gifted surgeon's right hand. Once her hand could massage life back into the heart she held, now it cannot grasp and release objects. When her physical therapy reaches a plateau without the necessary recovery to return her to the cardiac surgical suit, Caroline takes a month to recover in the Davis Mountains of West Texas.

Like Caroline, Diego Montalvo had once been terribly ambitious until a mission gone wrong burdens him with irredeemable guilt. Now Diego marvels that his hands, which once brought death, can bring forth life. As his grandmother ages, he steps into her place in the community as a healer where many of his people are more than a hundred miles from medical care and cannot afford it anyway. Nevertheless, his years as a medic have left scars much deeper than the ones displayed on his body and causing his limp.

Author Jean Brashear creates a powerful tale of spiritual healing in THE HEALER. Brashear's graceful narrative seamlessly bridges two vastly different worlds. Both Caroline and Diego undergo a tragic transforming moment that changes the course of their lives, leaving them with spiritual wounds as damaging as the ones that tear their flesh. In this searing tale, contradictions and impossibilities give way to hearts that need to rediscover dreams and self-forgiveness. Secondary characters, particularly Diego's insightful grandmother, provide intriguing depth to this powerful tale. Once again Brashear proves herself to be an author of fabulous richness, making her a favorite of romance readers. THE HEALER comes very highly recommended.