That Certain Spark by: Cathy Marie Hake

Gooding, Texas, doesn't know what hit them when Taylor Bestman, woman doctor, comes to town. With her sparkling personality, clever mind, and good looks, Taylor is a temptress. But there is one thing holding the men back ...

A woman doctor is unheard of. In school Taylor was the brunt of teasing, and here people refuse to let her treat them. And that includes Karl Van der Vort, a traditional and arrogant man. On the first page we find him drinking tea with a kind old widow who is keeping her eyes pealed for a wife for Karl. So we know the rest of the book will be a fulfilling of this prophecy.

But Karl is against woman doctors, so he can't marry Taylor ... right? When he is injured on the job, however, his opinion of her skills might just change ...

Speaking of marriage, Taylor's veterinarian brother, Enoch, has his eye on Mercy, a beautiful widowed mother of one. But after a big surgery, Mercy doesn't think she has what it takes to make Enoch content, and it could ruin their happy ending.

The town cannot resist Taylor's services forever. She's smart and she's got her brother supporting her all the way. That's what she hopes, anyway.

My thoughts:

I have mixed feelings about this book. One thing I appreciated was Taylor and her brother's obvious love for the Lord.

I love Taylor. She's so spirited that when I first started reading the book I thought "Wow. I want my novel to have a character like this," which is a good thing. But I thought the other characters were kind of silly and ... shallow. And I don't like Karl. And it's never good to not like the guy the main character marries. :)

One way to measure a good book is the amount of time you can get away from it without thinking about it, and my mind was never far from That Certain Spark. It is not often that you find a "clean" romance, but I think this was just that. Despite my disliking the characters (not everyone will, anyway) I thoroughly enjoyed this book (even if it is a little cliche).

Objectionable Content:


Language: None.
Romance/Sexual Content: Kissing. Mercy thinks after her surgery she can't marry Enoch because she won't fulfill his "desires as a man."
Violence: None.
Drugs/Alcohol: None.