THE CAJUN DOCTOR – SANDRA HILL
A Cajun Nove l
AVON BOOKS
ISBN-13:  978-0-06-256636-2
June 2017
Contemporary Romance

Alaska and Louisiana – Present Day

Dr. Daniel LeDeux is a pediatric cancer doctor in Juneau, Alaska, and right now his patient is ten-year-old Deke Watson, who wants to know what sex is like before he dies.  Meanwhile Daniel's mother, Dr. Claire Doucet, and her partner, Auntie Mel, just told him and his twin brother Aaron that she has uterine cancer that has spread to her lymph nodes.  Nine months later his mother dies, and two days later little Deke Watson also dies, although Daniel found his coke head father Jamie and cleaned him up and brought him to his son the day before he died.  At this point all the deaths of his patients are about to drive him insane.

In Louisiana, Samantha Starr is in court with her lawyer, Lucien LeDeux, to meet in a conference with her ex-husband, Dr. Nicholas Coltrane, his lawyer, and a judge.  Despite paying for his medical school, they have been divorced five years and he still wants more Alimony.  Samantha's family business provides her with a good salary and benefits, stocks, savings, and he also knows about the gold coins and bullion she has in a safety deposit box.

After their mother's funeral, Aunt Mel tells Daniel and Aaron about their Louisiana roots and their father Valcour LeDeux, and their mother's family, the Doucets.  Their mother wanted them to go to Louisiana and meet her relatives, and since Daniel has just quit his job as a doctor because death has haunted him too much, he and Aaron decide to go visit.  Valcour LeDeux was married when their mother got pregnant and he's had many other children, and like all of the LeDeux family, he's very charming, but a horndog loser all the same.  When they arrive in Louisiana, all of their relatives embrace them, especially Louise Rivard, or Tante Lulu as she is called, of an indeterminate age, and sure to get her nose in everybody's business.  Daniel meets Samantha at a party, but she is determined to never have anything to do with a doctor, so Daniel spends the next two years travelling as he wants or fishing, his depression still hanging on.  Living in an apartment at a fish camp, he's still trying to come to terms with his mother's death and the deaths of so many of his young patients.  Aaron is flying helicopters for cousin Remy's company and now wants to buy an old run down mansion.

Sandra Hill is still embracing the Cajuns in Louisiana, along with Tante Lulu, who has been featured in many of her Cajun stories.  Daniel is merely existing, stuck in a depression he has no interest in getting over.  Samantha goes to talk to Daniel about putting some of her abandoned animals in his outbuildings, but they soon realize they both have had the same steamy dreams about each other! Samantha is getting along okay until her half-brother, Angus, and a pregnant girl, Lily Beth Fontenot, come to her apartment.  Their story about the Louisiana Mafia being after Angus for owing them money for gambling, and Samantha's ex-husband Nick involved in a baby-selling operation is unbelievable, until they have to hide out at Aaron and Daniel's mansion before they are caught.

There are many Cajun aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews and their husbands and wives to meet, and each one is funnier than the last.  So much family is hard for Daniel to keep track of, especially intrepid Tante Lulu.

CAJUN DOCTOR is a laugh a minute, but Daniel is still unable to live without his mother, and seeing so many of his patients die for the past ten years.  Samantha may be prickly about a relationship, but Daniel constantly proves to her that he is the real deal, a caring man who just might love her all-over freckles.  Enjoy the Cajun life and meet up with old friends again in CAJUN DOCTOR.

Carolyn Crisher