Film Review: The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)

When it comes to films portraying the post-war veteran experience in America, this film sets the gold standard.  Following the lives of three very different veterans returning home after World War II, it looks at the complexity of veterans' family lives and relationships, their struggles to find work, coping with serious injury and disability, and more.  One is a family man with nearly grown children; another is a newlywed who married his bride right before going off to war; and the third is a young man who is engaged to his childhood sweetheart.  They each face different challenges and different family and relationship dynamics upon their return, and because of this, we get to see a range of post-war veteran experiences rather than just one single experience.  This enhances the quality of this film rather than detracting from it, and it really draws us in to all of their lives.

The storytelling in this film is wonderfully rich and complex, and it tells a story that remains relevant to this day, with struggles our own recent veterans are now facing in readjusting to civilian life, finding work, and reconnecting with their loved ones as changed men and women who are not the same as they were before they went to war.  It has the added bonus of actually using a disabled veteran actor, Harold Russell, to play the disabled veteran character, Homer Parrish, a double arm amputee who uses prosthetic hooks.  Using disabled actors to play disabled characters is unfortunately quite rare in films even today.  My one criticism is that Harold Russell, who was an unknown newcomer when he was cast in this role, does not share top billing with the other leads, despite being a lead character himself, and I understand that this is a result of Hollywood star power buying top billing, but it is important to note that Harold Russell won two Oscars for his role as Homer Parrish in this film and did a superb job portraying the depth and complexity of this character.

For me, Homer was the most compelling character of the film.  He returns home having already been through rehab and occupational therapy and having learned how to use his prosthetic hooks to the best of his ability.  The film highlights many of the things he has learned how to do, as well as those things which he cannot do, with or without his hooks, such as buttoning his own shirt.  But the film also looks at his relationship with his high-school sweetheart turned fiancee, Wilma, and his fears and insecurities about facing her with his new reality.  My favorite scene in the film comes toward the end where Homer and Wilma finally address these fears.

If you are interested in stories that really explore the issues faced by returning veterans, I've seen none better than this one; and if you liked the post-Vietnam War film "Coming Home", you will love this film.  It has romance, drama, and above all, realism.  It is a true and seemingly timeless classic and I highly recommend it.  You won't be disappointed.

Book Review: Morning Side of Dawn by Justine Davis

The third in a trilogy that includes Stevie's Chase and Left at the Altar, Morning Side of Dawn follows the story of "supermodel" Cassie "Cassandra" Cameron, who is being stalked and thinks she may have had enough of the world of modeling. Enter Dar Cordell, a friend of her brother's who is the only one able to protect her while her brother and sister-in-law are out of town on a much-needed family vacation and her sister-in-law's brother and his wife are dealing with a difficult first pregnancy. Dar is attractive, an athlete, and a double leg amputee who hides away from the world when he is not competing in - and winning - races. The two romantic leads are, perhaps, overly perfect - a supermodel and a super athlete, but this is a romance novel, after all, and they have their faults as well. There are many obstacles in their way, not least of  all their own stubbornness.

What sets this book apart from others in the romance genre is the handsome Dar Cordell, a very rare example of a double leg amputee being the leading man/hero of the story. Justine Davis realistically portrays his physical experiences and reality while, at the same time, showing him as attractive and desirable exactly as he is. If you like "wounded hero" romances, this is definitely one of the better examples of that genre. And it is not a bodice-ripper, although it does have its intimate moments which are well worth the wait as the story builds and Cassie and Dar's friendship and romance build along with it. It is sexy without being smutty, and it leaves you wanting more.

While this book is best read after reading the other two in the trilogy first, it also stands well on its own. It is intelligently written, well-researched, and, most importantly, it engages the reader in a way that makes you really care about what happens, not just to the main characters, but to the supporting characters as well. I definitely recommend it to anyone who enjoys wounded hero romances, and Dar Cordell is one of the best wounded heroes I've encountered in all of my reading. Justine Davis has shown real commitment to her material and to the various characters who are included in these books by writing a trilogy rather than stand-alone novels, and I have yet to find any other romance novels that even come close to giving us another hero like Dar Cordell.

Book Review: Left at the Altar by Justine Davis

Left at the Altar is the second in a series of three books by author Justine Davis. This sequel to Stevie's Chase tells the story of Stevie's brother, Sean, who lost his fiancee after he lost his leg. Now, Rory has come back into Sean's life and he is torn between the hurt and devastation he felt when she left him standing at the altar and the love he still feels for her. She is desperate for Sean to understand why she left, and she is in danger from the man she left him for. There is a lot more to her story than Sean ever knew, and as they reconnect, and as he learns the real reason she left him, we watch as Sean tries to decide what he feels for her and where to go from there.

Justine Davis has done her research well to portray an amputee character in an accurate and well-rounded way and as a romantic lead, and the reason she wrote Sean's story, she says, is because fans of Stevie's Chase contacted her and wanted to know more about Sean and to see a story with him as the lead.

This is an excellent wounded-hero romance, and I recommend not only this book but the whole series, which is best when read in the correct order. Start with Stevie's Chase (another wounded-hero romance about a man on the run [Chase] and the woman [Stevie] who figures out his true identity), then read Left at the Altar, and finish it off with Morning Side of Dawn, which is another excellent wounded-hero romance which tells the story of Sean's best friend, Dar, who is a double leg amputee, and Chase's sister, Cassie. I have re-read this series multiple times and still love them every single time. If you like wounded-hero romance, and if you like romance featuring characters like Sean and Dar, you'll like this trilogy by Justine Davis.

Short Story Review: "Helping Hand" by Eden LaFont

A little bit of research and a lot more detail could have made this story so much better, but I applaud the author's willingness to go where so very, very few others have dared to go in romantic/erotic literature.  I would not recommend buying this short story, however, because it lacks some very important elements which are both basic and necessary for good erotic literature.

I really wanted to be turned on by this story.  Truly, I did, but there just wasn't enough detail in the story to build myself a mental picture of the male lead, and the sex in the story lacked the emotion and sensuality that draws female readers in and makes us really feel and connect with the eroticism of a story.  Female readers like a story that ignites our emotions and not just our sex drives.  We like details that help us to visualize the characters and the scene.  And we like there to be an actual reason for the connection between the two romantic leads.  We like characters in whom we can see ourselves, and we like characters who are complex.  This story had none of these elements, and it was thoroughly lacking in emotional connection and eroticism.

While it was great to find a story with a double arm amputee male sexual/romantic lead, which is extremely rare to find, more detail and realism regarding James's arms would have greatly improved the story. For example, we are told that James has lost his arms in an accident, but we have absolutely no idea of how much of his arms he lost or the appearance of what he has left. The narrator describes them as "nubs" and "nubby arms", but we don't know if he lost them above or below the elbows, and we don't really have an idea of what James looks like or how he moves as a result of his injuries. As a woman with personal experience with the story's subject matter, I can tell you that these details do make a difference, both to the ways the characters touch one another and to the way the male lead wears and uses his prostheses.  There is a whole world of possibilities for erotic touch between a woman and a double arm amputee and the author sadly ignored all of them. 

Additionally, a bit more proofreading would have been nice. "Scaring" only has one "r".

For the low price I paid for the story on Amazon Kindle ($0.99), it was alright, and it definitely wasn't the same old story we've all read a thousand times, but there is definitely room for improvement.  If you want a really superb story to read with a similar theme, I recommend "Support Our Troops" by Robyn Bradley.  It's so very much better than "Helping Hand".