This series was recommended to me by someone a few years ago, and I’m just now getting around to giving it a shot. I really enjoyed this! It’s more contemporary romance than romantic suspense, but it’s a much more developed story than you get from something Harlequin-esque. Melinda is a fish out of water in Virgin River, and I liked seeing the town and its people through her unfamiliar eyes. The cantankerous old doctor is a bit of a cliché, but he’s endearing enough that it doesn’t matter. And who doesn’t love a Marine? The series as a whole focuses more on the town than on a specific main character, but I’m hoping to see familiar faces in the next books. If you like a little more meat to your romance, this is a series for you. ( )

I loved this book, and book 2 and book 3. The charaters are so easy to love. ( )

I read so many great things about this series, that I finally decided I had to read it. It was worth it.I enjoyed reading about small town life and all the interactions between neighbors and friends. Melinda and Jack were both great characters that I wanted to like. Jack took me a little longer to warm to, but Melinda was a nice, strong character from the get-go.My one problem with the book is a personal nit. I really hate when infertile people miraculously get pregnant the first time they weren't trying. It is demeaning. The odds of it happening are slim to none unless the person really didn't have problems. People do get pregnant after years of infertility, but come-on--it really is after years of no protection and trying, not one night together. I feel like this notion perpetuates to the fertile world and increases the stupid comment of, "Just relax and it will happen." Umm...no, it won't. Okay, so I could really keep going here on this nit, but I'm going to drop it now.The Ricky/Liz scene was a little creepy and I questioned the idea of a teenage sex scene, but after I thought about it, I guess I get it. I think it was mean to describe an "accident" (possible pregnancy) and then parallel with Jack and Mel and their "accident." Jack and Mel made a conscious decision to have sex without known protection while Ricky and Liz didn't--they hadn't planned on sex at all (at least Ricky hadn't). Maybe it went into too much detail, but it worked to show Ricky's youth and inexperience.Overall, a good book. I am looking forward to reading the rest of the series. ( )

Virgin River is a good read. Mel leaves L.A. to get away from the violence of the big city and moves to Virgin River thinking she'll be able to slow down and life will move at a slower pace. She also wants to do her midwifery in a small town where women aren't prisoners brought in with handcuffs.

Boy was she wrong. All sorts of things happen in Virgin River and she almost doesn't stay her first night. But an abandoned baby on the doctor's office the next morning changes her mind and things she extends her stay several times by a few more weeks. Mel finds purpose and that she is needed, which is exactly what she needs to help her recover from her past.

Jack had come to Virgin River to escape his past life of a Marine, a decorated Marine. He, too, longed for a slower pace and less violence. He's helped the town by renovating the cabin he bought into a grill and bar. Mel brings something out in him that no other woman has before. Can he convince her to stay?

Overall, this was a good read and left me interested enough to continue the series. ( )

"When recently widowed Melinda Monroe sees an ad for a midwife-nurse practitioner, she quickly decides that the remote mountain town of Virgin River might be the perfect place to escape her heartache. Instead, she finds a home in this first novel of a new trilogy." Low key, sweet and interesting. Will read others in trilogy. ( )