True to You by Becky Wade

Nora Bradford works hard at her job as the director of a historical site and genealogical library.  She tells herself that her work makes up for the pain from a messy breakup years before, and that she is very happy in her singleness. Then she meet ex-Navy Seal John Lawson.  He makes her heart race, and she is ridiculously pleased when he asks her to help him find his birth parents. Then she discovers that he has a girlfriend, and tries desperately to keep their relationship purely platonic. John has tragic secrets that he tries to hide from the perky redheaded Nora, but as they delve deeper into his family's past, those dark secrets threaten to ruin the budding romance between them.

After reading (most of) Pan's Labyrinth and The Giver of Stars, I was ready for another super light escapist Christian romance.  This one fit the bill.  I am finding that Becky Wade likes to use the most extreme examples of manliness for her love interest men.  In the last one I read it was a NFL quarterback, and in this one a Navy Seal.  It makes me wonder what next? (actually, I just checked, and found a hockey player, a champion bull rider, and a famous author, ha ha). She is clearly going for wish fulfillment appeal here.  Still, it was the absolutely clean, feel good story break I needed, so now I am ready to jump back into something a little less cotton-candy. (599 p. 2017)