A Seal at Heart

A Seal at Heart

By Anne Elizabeth

Being a Navy SEAL means everything to John "Red Jack" Roaker, but a mission gone wrong has left his buddy dead, his memory spotty, and his world turned upside down.  His career as a SEAL is threatened unless Dr. Laurie Smith's unconventional methods of therapy can help him.

Laurie's father was a SEAL - and she knows exactly what the personal cost can be.  She can't resist trying everything to help this man, and not only because she finds him as sexy as he is honorable.

As the layers of Jack's resistance peel away, he and Laurie unearth secrets that go to the highest levels of the military - and the deepest depths of their hearts.

I have the worst time reading romances: I always think they're going to be better than they are, and I end up disappointed and aggravated.  I think I read like, two good "traditional" style romances, and ever since then I am the eternal optimist.  I didn't even finish the last one I tried, An Extraordinary Union, which was like, on every top ten list.  I got forty pages in, thought to myself: "What a load of shit," and sent it back.  I did manage to finish A Seal at Heart, but that was mostly because of the challenge, and not because I enjoyed it any more.  It just drives me crazy when they do that "instant attraction" shit, and then decide to upend their whole lives because of someone they've known a day.  You know what's sexy? Getting to know someone!  Outside of the inside of their vagina, that is.  I read some Suzanne Brockman thing a while back and going along okay until the guy SEAL was like, "You know what SEAL stands for? SEa! Air! Land! The best of the best!" and I was thinking, "Sea, air, and land spell SAL, calm your fucking tits." The machismo can blow me. 

This one also had several things that were just not to my taste, including the idea that it's okay to fuck your physical therapist because "they don't have the same rules as doctors" and that great fallback of the accidental pregnancy with someone you had a falling out with.  Although this one was briefly redeemed for not actually being a pregnancy, merely womb hysteria, it sank again what with the fact that Laurie gets fucking punched to unconsciousness merely because she's trying to get her boyfriend and ersatz father to quit fucking fighting.  She's like, oh, let's just drop it, the military have it so rough when they get a domestic disturbance note on their record.  Like, FOR GOOD REASON.  Holy shit, we hear about how extraordinary the SEALs are every other second, and they can't figure out how to not get into a frigging fistfight on the street with their daughter's boyfriend?  And if I remember correctly, this fight happened because Jack didn't tell Laurie's dad they were dating.  Great reason to just whale on each other! Too bad Laurie had to ruin the fun by getting a concussion because your dumb asses don't know how to act like adults.  Totally called-for response.  So finding out two people you like are seeing each other: fist fight resulting in ambulances and police.  Finding out your daughter's knocked up and the guy who did literally hasn't returned a phone call in six weeks: buy him a drink!  Makes perfect sense.

Look, if you get accidentally pregnant, and you can't even get this guy to return a phone call for six weeks (because he'd been "ordered" not to have any contact with her.  Christ, it's a good thing he literally has a brain injury as an excuse because that's a super shitty thing to do) then I think it's a pretty big clue that you should not be planning a long term future with them.  I mean, do they ever explore how Laurie's experience growing up with SEALs and her resulting desire not become involved with one is solved, or are we to assume that Jack's dick has the power not only to heal his own memory but also to remove hers?

I will gloss over the whole "let's recreate the scene of my most traumatic memory on an island, just the two of us, plus some unloaded guns and explosives" because I was already mentally checked out by then, but that was in there too.

I picked this since I was really coming up blank on this prompt.  I just don't really watch that many shows or movies that have people reading real books in them (plenty of fake books though) and this one happened to pop up in Happy Death Day with a clearly visible title, and I was like, SOLD.  By the way, that movie is a hoot.  I highly recommend it, unlike this book.

14 - A Book You See Someone Reading On TV Or In A Movie