2 for 1 Bookfinders Special
June 1, 2012 5:05 AM Subscribe
MeFi bookworms, do you know either of these books?
Book 1:
White female, 20s, maybe has long (red) hair. Sold into a business-merger type marriage by her parents in late teens to much older man. She's an equestrian/show jumper? Has gymnastic training. (first husband dies at some point of a heart attack)
See/encounters a mysterious bi-racial man (Asian-American) who is a martial arts expert who owns a dojo & trains/teaches in mixed martial arts in (New York?) His dojo is well know/respected in neighborhood.
She wants to train, he disses her as a socialite gold digger, finally accepts her into his (very tough) training class. They fall in love, get married and then he decides he wants to travel to Asian country (China) to find mystical martial arts monastery.
She goes with and they're attacked while in the jungle by (drug dealers? soldiers?). She thinks he's dead, wanders around for a while and stumbles across the monastery. Monks don't want to train her but eventually she is trained including walking on the edge of a large empty basket. She might end up killing the head guy responsible for her husband's death.
She then travels back to the States and discovers the 'hero' is actually alive and thought she was dead.
Maybe: Cover of the paperback was black with an Asian type sword. The actual country of the monks may not be China or not named as China - I think there was something illegal about how the 2 main characters get in & out of this country, there is some restriction about foreign travelers.
The woman's first husband may have been named Edward, much older than her (older than her own father) that marriage may happen because her father is in debt to "Edward". I don't think that marriage is ever consummated (that is a surprise later on with the 2nd guy)
The 2nd husband (martial arts guy) comes off, in retrospect, as kind of a jerk.
Book 2:
A young woman is abducted, raped, tortured and murdered by a rich pervert & his gang of thugs. The local police know who committed the crime but don't have enough evidence to prosecute (rich guy has too much influence?). Pervert & Gang of Thugs may have done this to other young women.
Mother of victim is a widow of a military man. She asks his friends (black ops types) to train her to get revenge and starts taking down the pervert's gang one by one.
One remembered scene: she sews a dress that is one color (white?) from the front, another color (black?) from the back and goes to a casino to assassinate the main bad guy. (Bad guy may be the owner of the casino or son of the owner)
There are some detailed descriptions of the SEAL-type training the military guys put the mom through including time spent in a desert area.
I don't think there is any romantic elements and the mom fully expects to die during her "mission" & may actually be suicidal as her daughter was her last living relative/now has no reason to live. Mom may live in Florida or a southern state and most of the book may happen in the South East.
Both books published late 80s/early 90s as "trashy women's fiction". I'm not sure if they were actually marketed as romances. One or both of these books may have the word "Walker" in the title as in Shadow Walker, Sword Walker. I don't think either book was popular enough to still be in print.
(I am posting these together because they used to sit next to each other on my bookshelf and I thought I kept them but must of donated them in the Grand Book Purge of 2006. I may have bought the 2nd book thinking it was written by the first book's author but it was not - so the authors' names may be similar in sound but hey, my mind works in very odd ways)
Book 1:
White female, 20s, maybe has long (red) hair. Sold into a business-merger type marriage by her parents in late teens to much older man. She's an equestrian/show jumper? Has gymnastic training. (first husband dies at some point of a heart attack)
See/encounters a mysterious bi-racial man (Asian-American) who is a martial arts expert who owns a dojo & trains/teaches in mixed martial arts in (New York?) His dojo is well know/respected in neighborhood.
She wants to train, he disses her as a socialite gold digger, finally accepts her into his (very tough) training class. They fall in love, get married and then he decides he wants to travel to Asian country (China) to find mystical martial arts monastery.
She goes with and they're attacked while in the jungle by (drug dealers? soldiers?). She thinks he's dead, wanders around for a while and stumbles across the monastery. Monks don't want to train her but eventually she is trained including walking on the edge of a large empty basket. She might end up killing the head guy responsible for her husband's death.
She then travels back to the States and discovers the 'hero' is actually alive and thought she was dead.
Maybe: Cover of the paperback was black with an Asian type sword. The actual country of the monks may not be China or not named as China - I think there was something illegal about how the 2 main characters get in & out of this country, there is some restriction about foreign travelers.
The woman's first husband may have been named Edward, much older than her (older than her own father) that marriage may happen because her father is in debt to "Edward". I don't think that marriage is ever consummated (that is a surprise later on with the 2nd guy)
The 2nd husband (martial arts guy) comes off, in retrospect, as kind of a jerk.
Book 2:
A young woman is abducted, raped, tortured and murdered by a rich pervert & his gang of thugs. The local police know who committed the crime but don't have enough evidence to prosecute (rich guy has too much influence?). Pervert & Gang of Thugs may have done this to other young women.
Mother of victim is a widow of a military man. She asks his friends (black ops types) to train her to get revenge and starts taking down the pervert's gang one by one.
One remembered scene: she sews a dress that is one color (white?) from the front, another color (black?) from the back and goes to a casino to assassinate the main bad guy. (Bad guy may be the owner of the casino or son of the owner)
There are some detailed descriptions of the SEAL-type training the military guys put the mom through including time spent in a desert area.
I don't think there is any romantic elements and the mom fully expects to die during her "mission" & may actually be suicidal as her daughter was her last living relative/now has no reason to live. Mom may live in Florida or a southern state and most of the book may happen in the South East.
Both books published late 80s/early 90s as "trashy women's fiction". I'm not sure if they were actually marketed as romances. One or both of these books may have the word "Walker" in the title as in Shadow Walker, Sword Walker. I don't think either book was popular enough to still be in print.
(I am posting these together because they used to sit next to each other on my bookshelf and I thought I kept them but must of donated them in the Grand Book Purge of 2006. I may have bought the 2nd book thinking it was written by the first book's author but it was not - so the authors' names may be similar in sound but hey, my mind works in very odd ways)
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posted by francesca too at 6:22 AM on June 1, 2012 [1 favorite]