Shipping the Captain

Precise Shipping. This is the first book I've seen in the Valentine's Inc Cruises series to take on the actual staff, and it does an excellent job of showing the lives of the officers at least - at least the lives of two certain officers. :) Precise in details most normally miss (cruise ships don't actually use actual anchors much if ever any more) and plays with details when needed for the story (debarkation from one cruise is followed within minutes by embarkation of the next cruise, not the next day as shown here). But ultimately both the precision and the license are used very effectvely to tell a great story, and that is what matters the most. The brief descriptions of San Juan and St Thomas in particular are spot on in my experience in both ports, and even better is how well they serve the budding romance between these two. The scene where each realizes who the other is - after a relatively anonymous night together - is worth the price of the book alone, and Phoenix spins an amazing romance tale throughout the entirety of the book. As a romantic drama, one of the strongest in a truly excellent series, and very much recommended.