I’m a huge hockey fan. So, when I read that the hero of River Rising was a former hockey star, I became engrossed in the plot immediately. But River Rising isn’t about sports. It’s about murder and lust and the problems that can arise when the two become entangled.

Carly Samuels is a JAG attorney who has just been handed the biggest case of her career – the murder of a young colonel who is also a general’s daughter. The colonel’s husband is the main suspect. He was seen near the site of the murder by Ryan McMann, a former hockey star who was banned from the sport after carrying on an illicit affair with a drug-addicted, underage fan. Ryan has done time for his crime and he’s carrying a chip on his shoulder toward the legal system that sensationalized his trial and took away everything that was dear to him. He’s hostile to Carly’s questioning, even as he becomes increasingly fascinated by her. In turn, Carly is attracted to Ryan, even as she becomes more suspicious about his role in the murder.

The murder isn’t hard to solve. In fact, I had the figured out “whodunit” only a few pages after the culprit is introduced. And the climax, which involves a dramatic flood and rescue sequence, holds no surprises. But as predictable as the plot may seem, the story-telling isn’t. The book is fast-paced and written by a woman who knows what she’s talking about. Lovelace spent 23 years in the Air Force, and it shows. Careful attention is paid to each detail. And the ending, while not the traditional happily-ever-after, is beautifully stark in its realism.

The only real problem I had with the writing involved a particularly purple love scene where Ryan describes everything he’s doing to Carly in hockey terms. Maybe it’s my love for the sport, but the word “Zamboni” and sex just don’t seem to mix.

If the plot isn’t the most original, the characters certainly are. Lovelace has carefully avoided the temptation to redeem Ryan. In fact, the extent of or reasons for his past crime are never explained, except to say that he was guilty. There are no happy endings for him, just a lifetime of day-to-day recovery, which is refreshingly true to life. He’s darker than the traditional hero but, in a way, he’s also more vulnerable. He never admits that he’s in love with Carly, but his emotions show in his actions. By the end of the book, his character has grown and changed and the reader has become completely absorbed in watching the transformation.

Next to Ryan, Carly could have easily become an afterthought, but she doesn’t. Instead, Lovelace presents her as a strong woman who is still insecure enough about her height to wear spiked heels on a daily basis. We meet her family, who has instilled in her both pride and expectations, and her ex-boyfriend, a subtle kind of snake who specializes in pressure and manipulation. Ryan is a resounding presence, but Carly matches him word for word. She always knows the right thing to say, even as her thoughts betray her.

Time is also spent on secondary characters. The inmates whom Ryan tutors as part of his community service sentence each have distinctive personalities, as do the other witnesses in the murder trial. Even the murder victim, dead throughout the book, becomes a three-dimensional character, and a viscous one at that.

River Rising may not be the most original novel, but the struggles that the characters go through are engaging because of their realism. It makes a good read for those times when you want a romance, but not a fairy tale. And I breathed a sigh of relief at the ending. I cared about these people and I genuinely wanted to know what happened to them.