IMPOSSIBLE

Wealthy widow, artist lover.

Sasha Boardman is attracted to an artist who shows in her internationally famous gallery, Suvery Contemporary. Liam Allison is so tall, so rugged in that cable-knit sweater, and so, so wacky. Why, he doesn’t wear socks with shoes! Is Sasha, 50, ready for a walk on the wild side? Perhaps. Yet she still grieves decorously for her late husband, Arthur, a kind investment banker conveniently finished off by a heart attack in order for our heroine to Learn To Love Again. Her grown children will simply have to cope. Her son Xavier actually introduced her to Liam, but that was all about art—it never occurred to him that his devoted mother is a Lonely Woman With Needs. Liam also has Needs, but he can’t be bought and he won’t let Sasha boss him around, giving a stirring speech about his cherished independence. “Well, I’m an artist, Sasha. . . . and I won’t let you cut off my balls.” Sasha hastens to reassure him that she has no intention of doing so, and, somewhat later, her bitchy daughter Tatianna is appalled to encounter a naked Liam wandering about her mother’s apartment in a postcoital glow. How can she do that in Daddy’s bed? howls Tati. Xavier, the voice of reason, begs to differ. Other issues arise: it seems that Beth, Liam’s first love, still evokes powerful if mixed emotions in his wayward heart. . . . When Beth and Liam’s daughter falls through a giant, heretofore unseen, hole in the floor, severely injuring her spine, the plot stops dead in its tracks. Will Charlotte walk again? Will Liam return to Beth and make good on a long-ago promise? Will Sasha continue to suffer nobly through hospital vigils and late-night loneliness?

Cartoonish prose and skimpy storyline do little for a notably unsexy romance from the indefatigable Steel (Echoes, 2004, etc., etc.).