Moonlight Cove (A Chesapeake Shores Novel)

Will Lincoln and Jess O'Brien are childhood friends that cannot make the jump into an adult relationship. Add to the mix, Connie and Uncle Thomas who are mature adults who cannot make the transition from acquaintances to lovers. This book left me yawning throughout. I was unable to become involved with either couple, their thoughts and their total lack of emotion or any kind of mature involvement. The most interesting character in the book was the sous-chef, Ronnie, who had a part so tiny that I almost missed it. Go Ronnie. Good luck in your future. I did not finish the book, making it only to the half-way point, so I don't know how it ends and I, frankly, don't care. It was this total lack of caring for any of the principals that finally prompted me to give up and just delete the entry from my Kindle. It wasn't worth the electrons it took to download.

This books in just a continuation of stubborn love. I love the characters but each books seems just like the last book. Couples alway denying their love for each other. It is getting to be too predictable. I am on book 6 and I am struggling to read it. Don't take me wrong for I love Chesapeake Shores Novels ... nothing new.

This lates Chesapeake Shores series (3 books) are great as usual! I always go thru the store used books for used books and they are always good quality. This time I got the who series from one vendor. Worked great.

I enjoy Sheryl Woods' family sagas, and this one didn't disappoint me. Reading about the families in her novels allows one to escape to a town where you feel you just might like to live....if you could fit into the town and its close families.

To be honest, in this case, the story focuses ,outlying on the relationship between Jess and Will. Now, Jess has ADD, Attention Deficit Disorder, which afflicts many people.....probably to some extent, this reader. However, as an adult, people with the support that Jess has as well as someone who runs a successful business, too much emphasis was placed on her ADD. Most adults with ADD have found ways to deal with it....they have learned tricks which help them focus and manage to control their ways of thinking. Other than that, the feelings Jess has as she begins to develop a relationship, with her family background, are understandable....maybe a little too much emphases there also.

There are other developing romances in the story which will be handled in subsequent novels. These are just fun to "watch" and see them slowly develop. It is also interesting to watch the family dynamics and wondering what it would really be like to live in such a large, loving extended family. For this gal with a total of two cousins, I might find it interesting and exciting, but it might not take long for me to cave my privacy again. However, having a loving family like the O'Brians probably helps one find a true love over those people without a family like that.

Think I may have spelled O'Brians/O'Briens incorrectly....too lazy to look back in book......my apologies.

Psychologist Will Lincoln has loved Jess O'Brien since the two were in their early teens, but Jess, who struggles with attention deficit disorder, considers him a friend-and one with whom she barely gets along. How could they ever have a romantic relationship when she "knows" Will would be analyzing her not as a romantic interest but as a client?

Jess has overcome much in learning to manage her ADD and in making a success of the Inn at Eagle Point, even when it nearly fell into bankruptcy, but as an ADD child in a family of over-achievers, and still suffering from the abandonment of her mother who left when Jess was a child (even though she has returned and remarried Jess' father), she doubts she can make a success of any relationship with a man.

However, when two close friends decide to try a new local online dating service, she somewhat reluctantly joins them. When no dates are forthcoming, she becomes discouraged, not knowing that Will, the man behind the dating service, wants Jess for himself. A kiss from Will changes Jess' thinking, and she realizes she just might be interested in her family friend. Interest turns to jealousy when Will, in an effort to rid himself of his desire for Jess, tries his service to find a replacement.

While I enjoyed the nosy O'Brien family and thought Will a wonderful hero, even liked the other romantic side stories, particularly Connie's relationship with Jess' Uncle Thomas, I became annoyed with all the protagonists' indecisiveness when it came to committing. In particular, Jess' continual turning away from allowing herself to get closer to Will, and her constant tossing up of the ADD roadblock began to make this story seem like Groundhog Day. I wanted to shake her by the shoulders and say "Just get on with it." Sometimes, Will's indecisiveness made me want to shake him as well.

All things considered, Ms. Woods redeems herself by the end of this book and delivers a beautifully written story that will most certainly appeal to readers of the Chesapeake Shores series. Despite a slow start and indecisive protagonists, the ending will charm even the most jaded reader.

Originally posted at The Long and Short of It Romance Reviews

Frankly, although I usually enjoy Ms. Woods books, I was really angry when I read this book. Ms. Woods lack of understanding about people with ADD was infuriating. I was particularly annoyed with two scenes in the book, one when her brother, thinks that she misplaced his child, and the other, when Jess's employee jumps her about a forgotten order. Just how many of us have worked with people who have forgotten to do what they are supposed to do on the job? I know I have. I do not have ADD, but there are people in my family who do, and they have managed perfectly well.

Combined with the fact that the hero was a doormat, the heroine blaming everything that went wrong in her life on her ADD, and every other character focused on the heroine's ADD, that made this a book I was sorry that I had purchased.

Catherine Davis

Moonlight Cove is book six of Chesapeake Shores Series, and my first book by Sherryl Woods. Even though it belongs to a series it can be read as a stand-alone.

Jess O'Brien suffers from ADD and blames her errors and mishaps to this. She also doesn't believe somebody can love her the way she is. Two of her best friends Laila Riley and Connie Collings convinced her to join a new online dating service in their area. She accepts reluctantly, she does it almost because her friends force her. But when days pass and her two friends received invitations from men they have been match by the company and Jess doesn't received anything, she feels even more as a failure. It's not that she wants the dating service to work, the problem is she feels she is not good enough for anybody.
Will Lincoln is the only psychologist in the town of Chesapeake. Will also designed a program to match different personalities to find the most suitable partner for a person accordingly to the characteristics this two persons have in common. He is also the owner of Lunch by the Bay, the new dating company Jess and her friends are using.
Will has been in love with Jess since they were very young, but Jess has never seen him as anything different than her Brother's friend.
When Will received Jess application for Lunch by the Bay he doesn't know what to do with it. He loves Jess and wants her for himself and doesn't want to match her with anybody else. But his professionalism makes him include her information in the database, with the great fortune that the program doesn't match her with anybody else. Lunch by the Bay is just starting and it doesn't have many members.
Seeing that Jess is ready to find somebody, gives Will the push he needed to start to court her, before she finds somebody else. Will approaches Jess and lets her know of his feeling and intentions towards her; but Jess it's not sure, she thinks Will just sees her as a study case because of her disorder. For them to be together Jess needs to leave behind many of her preconceptions and Will's love needs to be strong enough to overcome obstacles.

In Moonlight Cove we see other couples developing a relationship. One of those is with Jess friend's Connie Collins. She has always been attracted to Jess uncle Thomas O'brien and in this book we see them getting together. I liked this relationship a lot, sadly, maybe more than Jess and Will's. Connie and Thomas are mature adults, with divorces behind them, who finally after many years find their perfect mate. I liked the message of a second chance this couple gives us.

Jess is a young woman who has battled with Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) her whole life. She was diagnosed at a late age, and this has made her a little bit insecure. She doesn't know her own value and sometimes she underestimated her own capabilities and possibilities. Because of her parents' separation when she was just a child, she also has some abandonment issues she needs to deal with before she can be happy.

Will is a very patience man. He knows what he wants and it's willing to go the extra mile to obtain it. He loves Jess deeply and just wants what is best for her. I think he is perfect for Jess, because he understands her behavior and doesn't let her use her ADD as an excuse.

In this book Mrs. Wood also shows us some glimpses of another interesting couple, Susie and Mack. They will be protagonists of Mrs. Wood's next book, Beach Lane, available May 31, 2011.

Moonlight Cove was a nice read, with some fun characters. The problem I encounter with this book was its pace. The first two thirds of the book are very slow, Jess and Will go back and forth, and nothing is happening for too long. This got to the point that I was mentally screaming at them, "enough! Or get together or separate, but no more go around, please!" I just wanted something to happen between them for the book to end.
In my opinion, I think Connie and Thomas relationship saved this book. If it weren't for them, this waiting for something to happen would have been worst.

Let's see where to start - no character development - apparently Ms. Woods is relying on the other books in the series for that. Zero chemistry between the hero and heroine. And then there's the ADD/ADHD angle that is thrown at the reader at every possible moment. Ms. Woods obviously never researched ADD/ADHD when she was writing Moonlight Cove. I've lived with it my entire life - first with my siblings and now, with my son. Instead Ms. Woods has filled her book with the ill-conceived perceptions of what people think ADD/ADHD is. She does a service disservice to those who deal with it on a daily basis.

Well...I was not all that impressed with this storyline. The main character suffers from ADD. The author got this one completely wrong or maybe just did not research the issue before writing a book about it. There were alot of areas where I felt that she had no clue what life with ADD is really like. It was more of a poor Jess has ADD story than anything else and it got really old. Her longtime friend Will has loved her forever and waited patiently on her. The story ends with a happy couple but there is alot of ADD roadblock to get through when reading this one.

MORE of that ridiculous cow??? Like we haven't been beaten over the head with her "poor little ADD girl abandoned by her mother" schtick for 5 PREVIOUS BOOKS?!?!?!?!?!

Where was your editor, Sherryl Woods? On vacation?

Helen Keller could have told you that we already knew everything about this pair than we wanted to know. Jess is annoying to the point of actual nausea, and Will (while a very nice guy) is just boring in his monomania over her.

The primary characters of this book should have been Connie and Thomas. Both of them are interesting, and there was plenty more to say about how THEIR relationship came together. And a COMPETENT editor would have told you that!

I'm having serious doubts about even buying the last book of this series--because I don't want to hear one single solitary additional word about Jess or her bedamned ADD!!!

Jess O'Brien and Will Lincoln have known each other a long time, but it's only recently that Will has made his romantic feelings for her obvious. Jess likes Will, but she's afraid of falling for him then losing him. Jess is insecure because of her attention deficit disorder and some painful issues from her past. Can Will convince Jess that there's no reward without a little risk?

Will is a charming, intelligent man, and he's very good at what he does. It seems someone is always coming to him for advice or he's offering it freely. Because Jess has ADD, everyone, including Jess herself, underestimates her. I vacillated between feeling bad for her and feeling frustrated by the plot of the story. Not because of Jess's ADD but because of how Jess is portrayed; she seems to play the role of the adolescent compared to Will who is more responsible and mature. Moonlight Cove is a slow and steady story with a large supporting cast and a charming romance.

nannette
Reviewed for Joyfully Reviewed

I must agree with the other reviews that this book was more infuriating at times than I would have preferred or other books made me feel. I believe that Jess's ADD was majorly overplayed and some of the things they were trying to point out are just simple mistakes that even every day people make. I kept felt the need to scream JUST GET OVER IT as I kept reading about the poor Jess O'Brien and to just get along with the story!

I still love the series and can't wait for the next though!

Her continuing saga of the O'Brien family keeps me interested .. and I have read quite a few of these. Even though I previously read a book that is set after this one, it was still great to see how the characters interact.

Psychologist Will Lincoln has loved Jess O'Brien since the two were in their early teens, but Jess, who struggles with attention deficit disorder, considers him a friend-and one with whom she barely gets along. How could they ever have a romantic relationship when she "knows" Will would be analyzing her not as a romantic interest but as a client?

Jess has overcome much in learning to manage her ADD and in making a success of the Inn at Eagle Point, even when it nearly fell into bankruptcy, but as an ADD child in a family of over-achievers, and still suffering from the abandonment of her mother who left when Jess was a child (even though she has returned and remarried Jess' father), she doubts she can make a success of any relationship with a man.

However, when two close friends decide to try a new local online dating service, she somewhat reluctantly joins them. When no dates are forthcoming, she becomes discouraged, not knowing that Will, the man behind the dating service, wants Jess for himself. A kiss from Will changes Jess' thinking, and she realizes she just might be interested in her family friend. Interest turns to jealousy when Will, in an effort to rid himself of his desire for Jess, tries his service to find a replacement.

While I enjoyed the nosy O'Brien family and thought Will a wonderful hero, even liked the other romantic side stories, particularly Connie's relationship with Jess' Uncle Thomas, I became annoyed with all the protagonists' indecisiveness when it came to committing. In particular, Jess' continual turning away from allowing herself to get closer to Will, and her constant tossing up of the ADD roadblock began to make this story seem like Groundhog Day. I wanted to shake her by the shoulders and say "Just get on with it." Sometimes, Will's indecisiveness made me want to shake him as well.

All things considered, Ms. Woods redeems herself by the end of this book and delivers a beautifully written story that will most certainly appeal to readers of the Chesapeake Shores series. Despite a slow start and indecisive protagonists, the ending will charm even the most jaded reader.

Originally posted at The Long and Short of It Romance Reviews

Usually really like Sherryl Woods books. This one was very disappointing. Still have 100 pages to go but have so lost interest. Nothing has happened expect a lot of blah blah self pitying whining about Jess's issues. If I was Will I would run!!!! Next time Sherryl dont just phone it in - you can do so much better.

What a bunch of whiners!!!!This is the second book I have not loved, nor liked.
I am an only child and admit I do not understand large family dynamics, but I grow less and less fond of the O'Brian clan as books go on. They spend most of their time minding everybody else's business.
I am now wondering if I have imagined enjoying past books by this author..or has she slipped bably??

Moonlight Cove by Sherryl Woods
Her friends talk her into a dating service and nobody signs up to meet with her.
Jess who owns the inn is ready to date.
Will has loved her forever and as a doctor he loves her for what she is.
He is the one who is discreetly handling the dating service.
The other family members give an appearance and we are able to catch up with them also
which is always nice. Will has a dating company and many are trying it out.
Connie and Thomas are also now dating and his best friend is Jake=her brother.
Susie is also dating.
Layla is seeing different men a few times a week and runs into a problem that Will can
kinda help with.
Mick and Megan are back together, just recently married he wants to see everybody
happy and tries to push others to hurry things along.

I have enjoyed all of the (A Chesapeake Shores Novel Books) so far. But I have enjoyed this one the best. Looking forward to reading the rest of this series. Love this family. Would recommend to all. Can't wait to see what happens with the rest of the clan.

I have enjoyed the other Chesapeake Shores books in this series but I'm not sure if I want to finish this one. Jess's ADD and whining about her mother's desertion is getting to be too much. I hope it gets more interesting with character development soon or I won't waste my time finishing it.