Allie O'Shea, dumpy little academic linguist that she was, thought someone was kidding her when a member of the CIA showed up in her office to recruit her to translate for a defrosted man being reanimated in Alaska. As much as she hated air travel, she flew to the secret base above the Arctic Circle. Before she could so much as draw breath, she, in a leather dress, leather boots and sporting a bear claw necklace, was "alone" in a reconstructed pseudo-Viking longhouse with a nude two thousand-year-old man, waiting for him to waken so they could talk. He was not a tall man, but had a commanding physique which Allie found irresistible.

When he woke, he started speaking Latin, but Kellorin Branson was a Celt. At first he had waked with amnesia but there was nothing wrong with his instincts. As soon as he saw his companion, he wanted her, and before the night was out, he "knew" her. He started remembering things bit by bit after his congress with Allie; he recalled that he and several others had been searching for women that had been stolen by invaders when he had fallen into the ice. He knew something was wrong about the surroundings. He pulled a piece of ice from the wall that turned out not to be ice but glass.

It hadn't bothered her that much that Kell had seduced her under the eye of the hidden camera, but it had been embarrassing knowing the scientific team was watching. Just when she had broken the news to Kell that he had been frozen for two thousand years, the scientists, thinking Kell had raped her and that he needed restraints, shot him with a tranquilizer dart and carted him off to be strapped down in an examining room. Allie found evidence that someone in the team was using Kell's "wild and uncontrollable" sex with her as an excuse to dissect him. She had to save him. But how?

Samantha Winston has written an excellent story that is a cross between the movies Encino Man and War Games. Allie is funny, entertaining and resourceful, and Kell is altogether surprising. I am enough of a rebellious old hippie to always appreciate the opportunity to root for the good guys against the evil system. A really fun read with an absolutely perfect ending.

Reviewed By: Allie
© July 2004