Legacy by Nora Roberts – a Review

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Description:
Adrian Rizzo was seven when she met her father for the first time. That was the day he nearly killed her—before her mother, Lina, stepped in.

Soon after, Adrian was dropped off at her grandparents’ house in Maryland, where she spent a long summer drinking lemonade, playing with dogs, making a new best friend—and developing the stirrings of a crush on her friend’s ten-year-old brother. Lina, meanwhile, traveled the country promoting her fitness brand and turning it into a billion-dollar business. There was no point in dwelling on the past.

A decade later, Adrian has created her own line of yoga and workout videos, following in Lina’s footsteps but intent on maintaining creative control. And she’s just as cool-headed and ambitious as her mother. They aren’t close, but they’re cordial—as long as neither crosses the other.

But while Lina dismisses the death threats that Adrian starts getting as a routine part of her daughter’s growing celebrity, Adrian can’t help but find the vicious rhymes unsettling. Year after year, they keep arriving—the postmarks changing, but the menacing tone the same. They continue after she returns to Maryland and becomes reacquainted with Raylan, her childhood crush, all grown up and as gorgeously green-eyed as ever. Sometimes it even seems like the terrifying messages are indeed routine, like nothing will come of them. Until the murders start, and the escalation begins…

Review:

Legacy by Nora Roberts is another one of her fabulous stand-alone novels.  We meet Adrian Rizzo, when she is 7 years old, as she sees her father for the first time, when he is drunk and maniacal; he threatens her mother, as well as herself.  When Lina (Adrian’s mother) runs to save her daughter, she manages to push him away from harming her anymore and he falls to his death.  Adrian is sent to her grandparents’ house in Maryland, to spend the summer, and try to forget the horror of what happened, while her mother continues travelling and promoting her successful career as a famous fitness guru.

Years later, Adrian sits in the school lunch room and makes friends with three nerds that most people ignored.  She explains to them that she wants to start her own fitness business for younger generations on DVD’s, and convinces each of them to help her create them with her as the star.  Hector is the technical guru to film the spots; Teesha is the savvy business guru and Loren, is the helper.  A bond is formed and together they create a fabulous business, and Adrian becomes just as famous as her mother.  I loved the friendship bond that the 4 of them have, as they became lifelong friends over the years. 

A few years after the death of the man who was her father, Adrian started getting threatening poems each year, with her mother saying she gets them too and to ignore them.  As the years go on, especially the last couple of years, the letters began escalating to three or so a year, with the poems even more threatening; the police are informed, and a private investigator is hired, with no results.   We do get an occasional POV for the person sending the threats, but no real identity. 

Over the years, it was wonderful to see Adrian eventually move to her grandparents’ house in Maryland, where she has family and even some of her friends move there too, in a calmer happy atmosphere.   The key to this story, besides the unknown threats, was the entire family setting. I loved all of Adrian’s friends, as well as Maya, her childhood friend, and especially her grandfather, who owned Rizzo’s Pizza restaurant.   The other big part, focuses on Raylan (Maya’s brother) who tragically lost his wife, and left him having to take care of his two children.  What starts out as a friendship, will later on become a slow burn romance, which I hoped would bring them together, as they made such a wonderful pairing.  I also loved loved Sadie, Adrian’s big dog, and Jasper, Raylan’s dog, who was so in love with Sadie.  Lol cute and perfect.

As we get closer to the last ¼ of the book, the suspense and tension increases as everything is escalating, with a crazed killer on the loose for other victims, and Adrian is on the list.  Legacy was a fabulous romance suspense thriller, that not only held my breath as we raced to the climax, but I absolutely loved the entire friendship, family bonds and romance.  Adrian was a fantastic heroine. Nora Roberts amazingly gives us so many wonderful characters in this book, which had me caring about them all.  Legacy is so well written by Roberts, and has a bit of everything; family, friendship, two wonderful and loyal dogs, children, as well as being an intense suspense thriller.  You need to be reading this book.

Reviewed by Barb

Copy provided by Publisher