FIRST OF ALL let me say "Thank You!!!" to Ms. Jackson for writing such a great book. Most Harlequin romance novels are so unbelievable I have to force myself to finish them. I sometimes wonder who goes through such drama in their lives. The other thing I love is the fact that Ms. Jackson doesn't take 3-4 chapters to get to the point. You have most of the setup that you'll need by the middle of chapter 2 and the love story builds from there.
That said, "A Little Dare" was amazing, realistic, and touching. After 10 years, Rochelle "Shelly" Brockman moves back to her childhood home with her son AJ. She's trying to give AJ a new start in life and remove him from the negative influence of his so-called friends in Los Angeles. She also hopes AJ will develop a relationship with his father, Dare Westmoreland. The only problem is that Dare doesn't know he has a son.

Now, in most Harlequin romances, the supposed hero would storm angrily into the heroine's life and forcibly demand a relationship with mother and son, leaving the rest of the story to his anger, supposed "revenge," and unrealistic turnaround. I was SO relieved to find out that wasn't what happened in this book. Dare picks up AJ and holds him at the sheriff's office for throwing rocks at passing cars. He doesn't realize AJ is his son (he didn't see the Westmoreland features in AJ's face) until Shelly shows up at the sheriff's office to pick him up. Once Dare has AJ's full name and birthday, he realizes AJ is his son. Dare is eager to establish a relationship with his son and he and Shelly scheme to have AJ break the news of his paternity to a (supposedly) unwitting Dare so that AJ will feel that he made the decision to have Dare as his dad (especially since AJ hates cops).

The rest of the story revolves around Dare's attempts to get his son to respect and admire him enough to ask him to be his dad. Shelly doesn't stand in Dare's way; in fact, she encourages AJ to spend time with Dare and get to know him. She doesn't realizes that Dare has also decided he won't live without his childhood sweetheart anymore and is very openly wooing her back.

With an amazing supporting cast, including all four of Dare's brothers (Thorn, Chase, Storm, and Stone), his parents, and the entire town of College Park, Georgia, this book is great reading if you want a realistic love story without anger, suspicion, hatred, silly plot and misunderstandings, and bad guys. This is a love story that could happen in real life. THIS IS A LOVE STORY WORTH READING!!! ( )

I really liked this one. I read it out of order, but still a great one. ( )