His Every Kiss

Laura Lee Guhrke has become one of my auto-buy authors. Guilty Pleasures is one of my favorite 2004 reads. Her latest book, His Every Kiss, is a wonderful story with strong, compelling characters: 4 out of 5.

Dylan Moore is a prolific and renowned composer when tragedy strikes. A head injury results in nonstop buzzing in his ear. He can no longer hear the music that has always run through his head and led to his compositions. In despair, Dylan decides to kill himself in a music hall. Once there, he hears a violinist playing a piece of his music. The mystery woman tells him he cannot kill himself, and for just a moment, Dylan hears music again. But the woman leaves before he learns her name.

Years later, Dylan still cannot compose music. Every so often, he releases a new piece of music from his early unpublished work so that no one will know the truth. Dylan now lives a life of pleasure found in alcohol, gambling, and women. One day, he sees the mysterious woman who saved his life. He decides to find this woman who makes him hear music again, and he learns that her name is Grace Cheval.

Dylan and Grace are fascinating characters. Dylan is no pseudo-rake, even though his bad behavior is about numbing emotional pain. Grace is a widow whose husband was an artist, so she is reluctant to put herself in a position where she will act as Dylan's muse. There's more, of course, because Guhrke is skilled with characterization.

I enjoyed several moments in His Every Kiss:

• The exchange of notes where Dylan asks her to meet with him and Grace makes excuses to avoid it.
  
• Dylan and Grace's chemistry.


• The end of the book, where Dylan must win Grace back.

This lovely book makes me excited about Guhrke's next release, which is due out next summer. In the meantime, I'm still looking for three books on her backlist.

Alyssa