by Danielle Steel
It seems only yesterday that Steel's first paperback became a surprise best-seller. Now, a dozen books later, here's her ladylike prose in an expensive hardback. The novel is set just before World War II, and the crossings of the title are made to Europe on board romantic liners. The heroine is beautiful and rich, the daughter of a San Francisco shipping tycoon. She falls in love with a rich Frenchman, much older than she, and when his wife dies the heroine marries him. Then comes the triangle: The other man is a steel magnate, handsome, rich and married to a terrible woman who wants to party all the time. Steel, 35, unlike many of the other writers in this genre, is discreet about sex. Oh, the characters go to bed, but there are no descriptions of what happens there. Her characters say things like "Strong people cannot be defeated." But what's strong about being born beautiful and with every worldly advantage? The heroine professes to suffer guilt about cuckolding her hero husband while he's off saving France, but her steel zillionaire sweeps her away. Right into the incoherent mush of the surrounding pages. (Delacorte, $15.95)
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