The Quinn Brothers

Author: Nora Roberts
Published: January 3, 2006
Category: Romance
Series: Chesapeake Bay (Seaswept and Rising Tides)
Rating: 9/10

I had just finished reading The Hunt Club the Tuesday before Harry Potter #7 was released and needed an easy read to while away the remaining time. I figured I'd read one of the two novels inside this omnibus edition. Ha! I was wrong, and read both Seaswept and Rising Tides in two days.

The Quinn brothers aren't actually brothers by blood. Their parents, Ray and Stella Quinn, were unable to have children, and chose to adopt three troubled boys (not at the same time) coming from abusive homes, starting with Cameron, the hero of Seaswept. Then came Ethan and Philip. After Stella's death, Ray adopted yet another troubled boy, Seth, but the difference with Seth is the ugly rumor that he's actually Ray's son, conceived through an affair with one of his students. It's made even uglier by the evidence of huge payments made to Seth's mother.

On Ray's deathbed, he makes his three older sons promise to keep Seth and raise him, as each (now) man has something to teach Seth. Cameron, as the brother without a set job (he used to race expensive fast vehicles all over the world), he had to play stay-at-home-parent and dealt with the tough social worker, Anna Spinelli. The social worker also had a hard time while she was growing up, but has healed thanks to her loving grandparents, and is trying to help other troubled kids through her job. She's also the stereotypical hot woman who tries to hide it behind her dowdy work clothes so people will take her seriously.

Ethan and Grace's story is quieter and sweeter in Rising Tides. They'd loved each other since they were teenagers, but Ethan always figured that with his horrible past, he shouldn't be with someone that bright and beautiful. Because Ethan denied his feelings for Grace, she went off and married a scumbag who ran off while she was pregnant, and she was estranged from her father because he was so disappointed in his little girl. At the end of the book, Grace bridges the gap with her father, and I actually cried at that point.

I really love how Nora Roberts' characters aren't perfect. Each one has some personality quirk or troubled past to overcome in the pursuit of happiness. The idea of the pieces of this family coming together and supporting each other is truly heartwarming and I kept wanting to know more about them. I also think it's the best malecentric storytelling I've read from Roberts. It was over all too soon for me, but luckily, the other Quinns' stories are told in the next omnibus, The Quinn Legacy.