Black Rose

The second book in the In the Garden trilogy is Rosalind's story. Roz has built a life for herself and her sons after being widowed when she was young. She has parlayed her talents and her funds into a successful gardening center. She works with her oldest son and two young protegees in widowed mother Stella and single mother Hailey.

When she was facing an empty nest as her son's moved off for their own careers, she entered into a marriage with a man who was a cheat and a liar. When she realized, she divorced him and thought that all she had to do was put her mistake in the past and promise herself never to make it again.

But when Dr. Mitchell Carnegie is hired to do a family genealogy and identify the Harper Bride who had been haunting show more the family for generations, Roz finds a man she can love and trust. But the ex hasn't finished with Roz. Between crashing her Christmas Party with his new woman, opening credit cards in her name, and resigning from her Country Club in her name having sent a nasty letter to the club, Roz has a lot to deal with.

Then there is the Harper Bride who has become more aggressive in the current situation. While still okay with the children, she is trying to interfere with all three women's new romantic relationships.

The Bride is identified in this one - not by name - by the role she had in a male Harper's life. She was a mistress whose baby was stolen from her to be passed off as the legitimate Harper heir. Taking her child drove her crazy and left her with a vendetta against the family.

I enjoyed this ghost story/romance. I love the depth of all the characters and the strong relationships between them. show less

This was so good! Roz and Mitch are stepping up their search for the identity of the Harper Bride and things are getting very interesting around Harper House. Of course, the ghost isn't too thrilled about Roz and Mitch's budding romance and decides to make her feelings known. Gotta love a good haunting! Can Roz handle it? Read it and find out.

I love these characters. Their is a delightful sense of family surrounding them and the close knit friendships are really well written. I also enjoyed the suspense in this book, including the side plot with Roz's ex. Bryce is a complete...um...jerk. It was a great opportunity to focus on her strength and independence.

Moving on to the final book soon!

I have no plans to read book #3 since I am sure it will just irk the living daylights out of me again. Book #2 was so good and I still have the same feeling I did back when I read this the first time, I didn't want it to end. When Roberts is good, she's really good. I just enjoyed the heck out of these books and was so satisfied by the ending.

In book #2, "Black Rose" we follow Rosalind Harper (Roz) as she does what she can to find out more about the Harper Bride (a ghost living in her family home for hundreds of years at this point). Taking place in Memphis Tennessee (not a typical romance location) we follow Roz as she she works with Dr. Mitchell Carnegie to try to find out the mystery behind the Harper Bridge. Roz is also still show more running her In the Garden business and doing what she can to be rid of the memories of her second husband who was a piece of dirt.

What I really loved about this book is that you see a flawed but strong woman in Roz. She feels so much more human to me than Hayley (Red Lily, Book #3) or Stella (Blue Dahlia, Book #1) ever did. Roz is 47 years old and she's raised three sons by herself. She still throughout this book mourns her first husband John. And she regrets letting loneliness sneak in and get to her which caused her to marry her second husband.

This was a slow burn romance novel and honestly I would say the romance wasn't even secondary this time. It was maybe third on the list. Most of this book really is about Roz, her sons, and her not letting her ex husband get to her when he comes back to town and does what he can to ruin her reputation. I loved seeing her friends and family rally around her. And I loved that Roz decided what she wanted when things turned to the romantic with Mitch. I wasn't really feeling Mitch even though I loved this book. Probably because most of this book was unraveling the mystery of the Bride who appears and gets really confrontational with Roz. show less

Roz Harper has a thriving gardening business and family and friends she dearly loves, but every so often she misses having a man in her life. Roz loved her first husband and the father of her children, but her second husband turned out to be a cheating, thieving scoundrel who left her wary of romance. When Roz hires a genealogist to investigate her family’s past, and hopefully discover the identity of the “Harper Bride” ghost who haunts Harper House, the chance for romance unexpectedly reenters Roz’s life. But once Roz begins dating Mitchell, the Harper Bride’s visits turn increasing violent as the ghost does her worst to prove to Roz that all men are untrustworthy. Roberts takes a smart, stubborn, and refreshingly older show more heroine, pairs her up with a hero who appreciates her strengths, and, writing with her usual sharp wit, works her reliable brand of literary magic in the second title in her Garden trilogy, an irresistible and occasionally quite-eerie tale of romance, family, and friendship. (BookList, 05-15-2005, p1641) . show less

Black Rose
3 Stars

In an attempt to learn more about Amelia, The Harper Bride, Rosalind Harper engages the services of genealogist Mitchell Carnegie to trace her origins. As they work together to uncover the clues to her identity, Roz and Mitch grow closer, but the Harper Bride is enraged by their burgeoning relationship and is determined to cut it short at all costs.

Unfortunately, this second book suffers from the same issues as the first. The developments in the ongoing arc concerning the ghost haunting Harper House cannot compensate for the excessive descriptions of plants and flowers and the uninspired romance.

To put it mildly, Mitch and Roz's relationship is boring. They have no chemistry and their sex scenes lack both sensuality show more and intimacy.

The subplot revolving around the machinations of Roz's ex has the potential to add some excitement and suspense, but never goes beyond annoying. That said, there are a couple of scenes with him toward the end that are very satisfying.

Susie Breck's narration of the audiobook makes it easier to slog through the boring sections. Hayley and Harper's story is next and I hope it will be an improvement on the first two books. show less

Roz is running a gardening business out of her home and has hired Mitch to help investigate who might be the ghost that has been in her historical home all her life. She suspects one of her ancestors, but wants to find out for sure.

This is the second book in a series (trilogy, I think). Unfortunately, it took me about 2/3 of the book to figure out who most the supporting characters were (though two of them would have been the main characters in the first book; I just remembered nothing about it!). Even after figuring out most of the characters, there were still a few that confounded me until the end. Anyway, I’m rating the book ok. The ghost story is the interesting part of the story. The romance – meh. Roz, I think, was 47 years show more old (my age), but to me, for some reason, I pictured her in her 60s! I’m not sure if I’ll read the last book or not, although I am curious to find out more about the ghost. show less

I've read enough Nora Roberts trilogies to know that the second one is usually the weakest of the three, and I like it the least. I read the first,
Blue Dahlia, way back in January, so by now I've forgotten most of the story. And there isn't much of an ending, because the seeds for the third book have been planted. But such is life for the middle book of trilogies.

Anyways, the main character of this book is the Matriarch of Harper House: Roz. She's sort of a southern businesswoman hardass whose not had an easy time in life. She falls for the cute professor who is researching her family history - specifically, the Harper Bride, a ghost that haunts the children of Harper House. Roz has an asshole ex-husband who is kind of cartoony (but the show more way she handles him is straight up cold shoulder and deadpan polite burns) and a garden business that, frankly, is probably not getting as much attention as it should have because everyone's getting funky.

Nora Robert's characters aren't perfect. What I like best about them is that they are flawed. Roz is too vain and haughty, Mitch (the cute professor) is a recovering alcoholic, and the other characters are also real in the same sense. I'm not too sure about strict southern manners, but the social situations that Roz deals with as the matriarch of an important old family - they made me shudder. But pretty good. I liked her Ireland trilogies better, but that's probably because Ireland seems much more interesting to me than Memphis. show less