The prologue of this book is a nod to the super-concise, affecting, memorable prologue (and epilogue) in Flickering Flames, the previous book about Nancy and Damon. Further on during the reading of this book, I formed a nice attachment to one of the youngsters the couple meets at the hospital.

However, I have to admit that Nancy and Damon's experience at the center of the plot wasn't believable enough to me. For two mature, Black American adults, they both seem fairly naïve about the reality of racism, especially Nancy. In life, it's so common for Black people to get rather familiar with racism early on, often as young children. We learn through experience and/or word of mouth in our families and communities. Somewhere, somehow, the reality tends to reach us at some point before we're fully grown.

Although the exchanges in question in this story are relatively short, it felt off to me when other characters, from their outside positions looking in, had to enlighten Nancy and Damon about the dangers of racism, with one character giving Damon advice on how he should (or shouldn't) deal with racism in his thinking. Aside from that, there's certain stuff I've never heard or heard of Black adults having to spell out for each other while alone in conversation. Some of the private dialogue between Nancy, Damon, and another Black character in this book sounded unnatural to me on that score.

Also, I found the several attacks spelling out the N-word, sometimes in all caps, to be excessive content-wise and repetitive story-wise. I'm not sure everyone realizes just how strong of a word it is in the context of a slur. But it's my firm opinion that if you would consider the F-word to be inappropriate content to spell out in a particular book, or specifically in a Christian Fiction book, then you shouldn't spell out the N-word. Especially not in multiple scenes.

On another note, although this is a romance series overall, I'd call this book suspense or suspenseful contemporary fiction with some romance in it. Damon and Nancy's romantic relationship itself isn't their issue here, and Shina's romantic relationship in the subplot isn't something the reader gets to see her grow into. Sometime before the beginning of this book, Shina started seeing someone; here, she tells Nancy early on that she isn't in love with the guy. A few pages later, during the first of only about three times the reader actually sees Shina and her guy together, she's suddenly convinced that he's the only man who'll ever be for her. Their relationship mostly exists in the background, behind Damon and Nancy's story.

There's also a lot in the novel in terms of Bible passages, spiritual lessons, and teaching on salvation, maybe more than in the previous books in the series. It's a matter of preference for me, but I tend to think less can often be more to get a faith message across in a story. I won't go on about that now, but if anyone reading this wants to ask about my perspective on the topic, you're welcome to. On a technical note, the various Bible chapter and verse numbers (along with the different Bible translation abbreviations) in parentheses or brackets are often an unnatural fit within this novel's narration and the characters' dialogue.

Even so, this isn't the only book by this author that disproves a certain misconception that Christian romance or romantic ChristFic is always nothing more than sweetness and fluff, staying away from tough issues. And as I've mentioned before, this author paints such beautiful pictures of the Puget Sound area.

I read the fifth and last book in the series a number of years ago and plan to revisit it. I'm curious to see what all I've forgotten about the end of the series. ( )