Linda Windsor Fiesta Moon

Fiesta Moon

Linda Windsor

WestBow Press, 2005, $13.99

ISBN: 0785260633

At Madison Engineering, CEO Blaine Madison lectures his brother Mark for his third DUI offense. Tired of his sibling's shenanigans Blaine offers Mark a deal; if he brings in the hacienda contract on time and sober, he can take over the on-site management of their projects. Mark readily agrees as he wants to travel anyway while wondering why Blaine prefers to stay home with his wife and children.

Corinne Diaz came to Mexicalli, seeking information on her biological mother at the last known place she lived. She works at the Hoger de los Ninos orphanage at the local orphanage when Mark arrives to take charge of the renovation project. Corinne thinks very little of the alcoholic hedonist though she is attracted to him. He wants her too, but hates the scorn in her eyes. Matchmaking them is a haunted piglet who adopted Mark as her pet. However, what begins to bring the two outsiders together besides a deep attraction is someone, perhaps a voodoo practitioner, who wants the project stopped and them out of town.

Mark is an interesting character who all his compared unfavorably to his successful siblings, using charm with no substance to compete. However, Corinne, who initially write him off as a playboy with no core, begins to see little things in him based on his interactions with the children and his piglet; she encourages him and the underachiever begins to accomplish the mission. That Pygmalion Effect transition is the key to the inspirational romance FIESTA MOON; a fine Moonstruck tale filled with humor and a serious undercurrent that the locals believe is a voodoo curse on Mark while he deems that he is simply doing God's work.

Harriet Klausner