Sweet Liar

It was her father's dying wish that Samantha Elliot search for her grandmother, who'd disappeared from Louisville when she was a baby. So here she was, in big, dirty New York City…her parents were dead, her divorce was final, and she was all alone….
Michael Taggert was Samantha's landlord, and he was easily the most beautiful man she'd ever seen. He was charming, too — his zest for life was so contagious that in his presence Sam bloomed like a flower after the rain. Yet Mike could only get so far with her — when he tried to get closer, it was like running into a brick wall.
But Mike wouldn't give up. As they probed her grandmother's past, he was slowly uncovering the joy and affection Samantha had buried long ago — and leading them closer to the dangerous truth about a bloody spring night in 1928, and a seductive blues singer named Maxie….
From Publishers WeeklyPerennial bestseller Deveraux ( The Duchess ) involves yet another spunky heroine in a formulaic romance. After her divorce and her father's death in early 1991, 28-year-old Sam Elliott arrives in New York City to search for clues to the riddle of her grandmother's mysterious 1964 disappearance. Her father's will directs her to spend a year on this quest while renting an apartment from his young friend Mike Taggert, who is writing a book about Prohibition-era gangster Doc Barrett. Mike needs Sam's assistance to land an interview with the still-living Barrett, and despite her fear of her dangerously attractive landlord she becomes increasingly involved with his work and attracted to both him and his large, loving family; she also comes closer to the truth about her grandmother's bizarre past. Deveraux knows Manhattan and provides entertaining descriptions of the speakeasy age in Harlem, but her cliche-laden dialogue makes it seem that her characters speak English as a second language. The highly improbable story line, overloaded with convoluted plots and subplots, will discourage even the most die-hard romance fan. Literary Guild and Doub le day Book Club main selections.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Kirkus ReviewsHuge-selling historical-romancer Deveraux (The Duchess, A Knight in Shining Armor, etc.) moves from 19th-century Scotland to present-day Manhattan for this valentine to conspicuous consumption--here, starring a self-righteous heroine with the inchoate inconstancy of a hormone-addled 12-year-old. Orphaned at 28 by her father's death, Samantha Elliott has seen more death than most people experience in a lifetime.'' First, she lost her grandparents; now both parents are dead. Fresh from New Mexico, Samantha is in New York to honor her father's will, which requires her to live there for a year while searching for the grandmother who disappeared when she was a toddler. But Samantha is soon paralyzed by depression and a morbid fear of the city; fortunately, though, Superman is close at hand in the muscle- bound person of Samantha's landlord, tall-dark-'n'-handsome Mike Taggert--who gives her the most passionate kiss of her life when they first meet and before they've exchanged even a word. Together, Samantha and Mike will reconstruct her grandmother's fate (much of which is strikingly similar to the 1985 movie Maxie). In the process, Samantha has an emotional reunion with her only surviving relative, gradually gets back in touch with her feelings, and discovers in herself a passion for shopping so pure that she sings paeans even to thevery pretty lavatory'' in a Ralph Lauren shop. And, yes, she falls hard for Mike, who gets her pregnant and then marries her, a true hero for the '90s. Super-dumb and super-tedious. (Literary Guild Triple Selection for October) — Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.