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The Golden Thread by Celestine Forza Black Rose Writing
book review by Roland Inskeep
"We were two refugees with one life vest and no knowledge of how to swim."
What can you do if you have been a mafia princess all your life and you decide to go against the family's wishes? What if the perks of organized crime, with its sumptuous homes and lavish lifestyles, are simply not enough to keep you happy? You have to be one tough cookie with more than enough street-sense to outsmart the mob. You have to be as ruthless and tough as the wise guys who are there to keep you in line. And if your reason for leaving is love, well, just read this combination romance-crime fiction by author Forza for a vivid account of one young woman's struggle to emerge from a twisted world of cruelty and crime to one where honesty and respect rule the day.
Using highly colloquial language that makes these characters real, Forza describes the vulnerability and openness needed for true romantic love to become possible in this milieu. The author's strength is in portraying her protagonist's inner struggle to break free from the false emotions and control-obsessed ways of her family. The deeply felt turmoil of conflicting motivations and ways of viewing the world are drawn with a brutally honest frankness. Her heroine is capable of extreme cruelty and the author pulls no punches here, but Forza also shows how emotional walls start to crumble under the power of love. For this kind of development and growth to happen in a mafia world, where the past determines everything and the only relations are power plays, the freedom to be real is necessary. Mafia-connected people seem to be little more than options or liabilities—here today and perhaps gone tomorrow. For an authentic being to be reached, and to satisfy the urge for real human connections, the author shows us that all the promises and dangers of real and true love must be embraced. These characters begin to reach for that kind of love in Book One of Forza's series. It is a wild ride with moments of both sly humor and shocking brutality. The authors skill makes us want them to succeed.