From Publishers Weekly
The eccentric Russo clan from Criswell's first contemporary romantic comedy, The Trouble with Mary, delights readers once again with their insatiable wit and boundless spirit. This time, however, the Russos share the stage with the Goldmans. Having grown up in Baltimore's Little Italy with a Jewish father and an Italian mother, Annie Goldman feels caught between two worlds and is determined to flaunt her individuality. She dyes her hair a different color daily and drives Father "what-a-hunk" Joe Russo crazy with her curve-hugging clothes. Annie once dreamed that she would have a future with Joe, but her hopes were dashed when he left her to join the priesthood. Now, 15 years later, Joe has decided to hang up his rosary beads and give love another try, but Annie isn't sure if she can trust him again. While the two attempt to rekindle their romance, Annie becomes a part owner of her father's outdated clothing store and an unwilling host to her cousin Donna. Joe has his own problems to contend with as well namely, his domineering mother and her matchmaking machinations. Criswell's dialogue is sharp and humorous, and her colorful characters liven up the narrative. Although Criswell is better known for her westerns, this is a tantalizing tale that her fans will eagerly embrace. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Annie Goldman and Joe Russo were in love as teenagers; they had even planned to get married. Then Joe became a priest. Now 15 years later, Annie is as beautiful, outrageous, flamboyant and single as ever, and Joe (Father What-a-Hunk) is leaving the priesthood because he can't get Annie out of his mind. But Annie hasn't quite forgiven Joe for deserting her; in fact, she is still furious and getting even is sounding better all the time. Fast-paced, hilarious, and thoroughly delightful, this spin-off from Criswell's best-selling The Trouble with Mary (Ivy, 2001) is a winner that will have fans waiting to see what she will come up with next. Criswell is a popular writer of various types of romance, most recently upbeat romantic comedies, and lives in Fredricksburg, VA. Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
Annie Goldman--outlandish, outspoken, and half-Jewish--and Joe Russo, a sexy Italian priest, were engaged 15 long years ago. Annie has never forgotten Joe nor has she forgiven him for dumping her, and Joe hasn't forgotten her either, in fact, he's decided to leave the priesthood to try to recapture what they once had. The only obstacles he faces are his mother, who now dresses in black because he left the exalted priesthood and lowered her social standing in their Baltimore neighborhood, and Annie herself, who doesn't trust him to commit. Annie has her other woes: her self-centered cousin has moved in with her, and now that her storeowner father has asked her to be a partner, they're at odds. Naturally, Annie leads Joe on a wild chase, but the patience he learned in church serves him well. The hilarious follow-up to The Trouble with Mary [BKL Ja 1 & 15 01], this will make readers look forward to the next humorous Criswell romance. Patty Engelmann
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Publisher's Weekly, May 28, 2001
"Criswell's dialogue is sharp and humorous, and her colorful characters liven her narrative. This is a tantalizing tale..."


Review
“Romantic comedy has a new star and her name is Millie Criswell.”
–JANET EVANOVICH



Romance Reviews Today, Internet Site
"(Ms. Criswell's) second contemporary sparkles with fun and laughter. It's a winner!"


Book Browser Reviews, Internet Site
"An amusing tale with serious overtones that Millie Criswell deftly intertwines in the plot...a fine tale fans will enjoy."


The Belles and Beaux of Romance, Internet Site
"An uproariously funny romantic comedy that will have you laughing and from beginning to end. Criswell's writing is simply brilliant!"


Review
?Romantic comedy has a new star and her name is Millie Criswell.?
?JANET EVANOVICH



Book Description
After winning awards for her delightful historical romances, author Millie Criswell has now turned her talents to contemporary fiction, whipping up delicious confections of romantic mischief filled with refreshing wit and charm. In What to do About Annie? a provocative game of revenge turns into a most unexpected date with destiny.

WHAT TO DO ABOUT ANNIE?

She’s outspoken and outrageous. She’s tired of swimming in the dating pool. And most of all, Annie Goldman has played bridesmaid for the last time. Of course no one would ever suspect that she still carries a torch for Joe Russo. Fourteen years ago, Joe ruined her with seductive promises of love and a future. That was right before he became a priest. But seeing Joe at her best friend’s wedding makes Annie realize: it’s time to forget Father What-A-Waste and grow up.

Even as a teenager, Annie had a body made for sin. And young Joe had been willing to break a few commandments. Now, more than a decade later, Joe is ready to quit the priesthood and is prepared to face the delectable woman he tried to pray out of his system. He wants her forgiveness–what he gets is an unholy torture that’s impossible to resist . . .



From the Author
WHAT TO DO ABOUT ANNIE? is a spin-off from my January USA Today bestseller THE TROUBLE WITH MARY. Annie Goldman is Mary Russo's best friend. She also happens to be in love with Mary's brother, Joe, who dumped Annie to join the priesthood. This was a challenging book to write, but also quite rewarding, as these two people with a shared history, and very little in common, struggle to put their differences behind them and make a life together. Of course, true love doesn't run a smooth course, especially when you come up against a headstrong Italian mother like Sophia Russo! There are plenty of laughs to go around in my latest romantic comedy, which I hope you will enjoy.


From the Inside Flap
After winning awards for her delightful historical romances, author Millie Criswell has now turned her talents to contemporary fiction, whipping up delicious confections of romantic mischief filled with refreshing wit and charm. In What to do About Annie? a provocative game of revenge turns into a most unexpected date with destiny.

WHAT TO DO ABOUT ANNIE?

She’s outspoken and outrageous. She’s tired of swimming in the dating pool. And most of all, Annie Goldman has played bridesmaid for the last time. Of course no one would ever suspect that she still carries a torch for Joe Russo. Fourteen years ago, Joe ruined her with seductive promises of love and a future. That was right before he became a priest. But seeing Joe at her best friend’s wedding makes Annie realize: it’s time to forget Father What-A-Waste and grow up.

Even as a teenager, Annie had a body made for sin. And young Joe had been willing to break a few commandments. Now, more than a decade later, Joe is ready to quit the priesthood and is prepared to face the delectable woman he tried to pray out of his system. He wants her forgiveness–what he gets is an unholy torture that’s impossible to resist . . .



From the Back Cover
“Romantic comedy has a new star and her name is Millie Criswell.”
–JANET EVANOVICH



About the Author
National bestselling author Millie Criswell didn’t start out to be a writer. Instead, she had aspirations of joining the Rockettes as a toe-tapping member of their dance troop, or tapping her heart away in one of those big, corny MGM musicals. Of course, she was only ten at the time, had absolutely no talent as a dancer, and cannot be blamed for her failure to succeed.

To date, Ms. Criswell has written nineteen historical, category, and contemporary romances. She has won numerous awards, including the Romantic Times’s Career Achievement Award, the Reviewer’s Choice Award, the National Readers Choice Awards, and the coveted MAGGIE Award from Georgia Romance Writers.

Ms. Criswell resides in Virginia with her husband of thirty-one years. She has two grown children, both lawyers, and one neurotic Boston terrier.




Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
ONE

“An old maid who marries becomes a young wife.”

Being a bridesmaid sucked!

Even if you were the maid of honor.

And weddings were totally overrated.

Annie Goldman knew this because she was presently in one—her best friend Mary’s, to Dan Gallagher.

It wasn’t bad enough she was dressed like a rose-tinted marshmallow, surrounded by other rose-tinted marshmallows. No, she had to endure wearing the hideous tulle headpiece—a headpiece even Queen Elizabeth would have objected to. And everyone knew Liz, who probably carried Prince Philip’s family jewels in those frumpy purses she toted, had no taste.

Sophia Russo, Mary’s mom and dictator extraordinaire, had insisted that her daughter could not be married without bridesmaids in tulle headpieces. Most likely tulle was some type of fertility material—Annie sure as heck hoped not!—because Sophia was planning on lots of grandkids.

Annie had never been a maid of honor before, and she had no intention of ever being one again. The reasons were numerous: The clothing was hideous; you had to hold the bridal bouquet; make sure you didn’t fall on your face while marching up and down the aisle; and you were forced to wear a serene smile, which gave you the appearance of suffering from a serious case of gas.

Though on the latter she was covered, because her father, Sid, seated five pews back—and trying not to look too Jewish among all the Italian Catholics, despite the fact he wore a kippah—carried chewable Maalox with him wherever he went. Of course, if her father should happen to forget his antacids, one just had to search through Gina’s purse to find a drug supply second only to old man Moressi’s pharmaceuticals.

Her mother wasn’t a drug addict, just a hypochondriac who believed in being prepared.

Gina Goldman was the Boy Scout of hypochondriacs. She had more ailments than Baskin-Robbins had flavors. What would be a headache to most people was a malignant brain tumor to her mother. Thirst translated into diabetes, a stomachache to ulcers, and on a particularly bad day a mild rash was usually construed as flesh-eating bacteria.

Dr. Mankin had given Gina a clean bill of health after her physical last week—her weekly physical—but she refused to believe she wasn’t dying, which drove Annie’s father crazy.

“The woman’s a nut! She’s healthy as a horse and still she kvetches! She should go in good health.” Which, in reality, meant quite the opposite.

Annie had been surprised—stunned, really!—when her mother had shown up at the church today, because this morning she’d been dying of food poisoning.

“God forbid, but if I should die today, Annie, you’ll take the Limoges china. I don’t want the Goldman girls to get it.”

Gina despised her sisters-in-law, who had never really accepted a gentile into their midst, but she was fond of Mary, liked and respected Mary’s brother, Joe, and so had made a special effort to overcome her latest fatal affliction.

Father Joseph Russo was performing the mass and the ceremony today. And he looked damn good in his vestments! The ladies of the parish called him Father What-a-Hunk behind his back, and it was more than fitting.

The priest was well over six feet tall, dark-haired, brown-eyed, and had dimples in his cheeks that put Shirley Temple to shame. He’d been compared to everyone from Mel Gibson to Rupert Evertt, though Rupert was purportedly gay—a major waste to womankind!—and Annie knew firsthand that Joe was not.

Joe would be mortified if he knew what was being said about him. Unlike Annie, he didn’t draw attention to himself, so she thought it might be prudent and very amusing to enlighten him. It was the least she could do.

There was no doubt that his holiness was a hotty. Under those vestments lurked the body of a man who worked out on a regular basis. Sinewy forearms, bulging biceps, muscular chest, and . . .

Well, it wouldn’t be prudent to venture below the waist while in church. She didn’t want to be struck down, smited a mighty blow, turned into a pillar of salt— No, wait! That was Lot’s nosy wife.

The man should have been called Father What-a-Waste, in Annie’s opinion, because celibacy and Father Joseph Russo just didn’t go hand in hand.

“I, Mary Russo, take you, Daniel Gallagher, to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or for worse . . .”

As his younger sister recited in a whisper-soft, dreamy voice the vows that would bind her to Daniel Gallagher forever, Joe’s gaze slipped from the lovely bride before him to the woman standing solemnly next to her.

Or as solemn as a maid of honor could look sporting hair the same rose color as her form-fitting satin gown.

The beautiful woman was anything but maidenly. And she certainly wasn’t demure. She was outspoken, outlandish, and quite unorthodox, a free spirit who was totally unconventional.

Annie Goldman had captivated him from the first moment he laid eyes on her: she was six and as scrawny as a gangly filly; he was eight, just as scrawny, and had no use for girls.

Not then, anyway.

For an instant their eyes locked. Hers widened in appreciation, then narrowed slightly before she hurriedly looked down at the pink baby roses in her hands, while his filled with regret.

If only things had turned out differently.

His soon-to-be brother-in-law cleared his throat loudly, drawing Joe’s attention back to the bridal couple and the matter at hand. They looked confused and a little bit dismayed. Not that he could blame them.

Smiling apologetically, he continued on with the ceremony. His sister’s wedding would be his last official duty as parish priest of St. Francis of Assisi’s Catholic Church, though nobody knew it as yet.

Joe was hanging up his rosary beads after today and quitting the church.

It hadn’t been an easy decision, but it had been one a long time in coming. He’d grown disillusioned with the church—or more, his lack of contribution to it. He’d become a priest for all the wrong reasons, he knew that now. And though he wasn’t one hundred percent certain quitting was the right thing to do, he intended to go through with it.

He had feelings that needed to be sorted out and dealt with. Feelings no man of God should possess within the confines of a church—or outside of it, for that matter. And questions that needed answers, like: What to do about Annie?

“You made an absolutely gorgeous bride, cara,” Annie told Mary later at the reception. The music of the Paisans, the band that comprised five Russo male relatives of various ages, from fifty to eighty, blared loudly from the overhead speakers.

They weren’t the Beastie Boys, but they weren’t exactly Guy Lombardo, either.

“Uncle Tony’s version of ‘That’s Amore’ is going to make Dean Martin turn over in his grave,” Mary said, looking uncertain and apologetic at the same time. “But they came cheap. My father’s brother practically begged for the gig. Or so I was told.” Her expression remained skeptical.

“Meaning they were free, right?” Annie knew Mary’s mother was big on bargains and saving a buck. Sophia had finagled a deal with the VFW, so the reception could be held at their large banquet hall. Never mind that a Sherman tank sat in front of the building.

“So what if there’s a tank?” Sophia had told her daughter when Mary expressed concern. “The trouble with you, Mary, is that you’re not patriotic. Those old geezers risked their lives to save us from the Nazis, so you could get married in this hall.”

Sophia had a thing about Nazis. Especially now that she couldn’t voice her sentiments about the Irish. At least not aloud. Mary’s new husband was of Irish descent, and Sophia had been forced to rein in her tongue. A blessing for everyone concerned, Annie decided.

“We have to feed them, that’s about it,” Mary said. “Thank goodness Marco agreed to cater the event. At least I know the food will be good.”

Marco Valenti was head chef at Mary’s restaurant, Mama Sophia’s. He was temperamental as hell, had the disposition of Attila the Hun, but was an excellent cook. If you had a thing for the Pillsbury Dough Boy, Marco was your man.

The irritating little chef was presently teaching Annie how to cook, and she was driving him nuts in the process, which seemed a fair exchange. Paybacks were tough. And Marco had annoyed the heck out of her on more than one occasion with his bossy ways and air of superiority.

Mary shook her head and winced when Uncle Tony hit a high note only a dog could appreciate. “The way they sound, I guess it’s good we didn’t have to pay them.”

“Such a deal!” Annie mimicked her father perfectly. “What more do you want? Gabriel coming down from heaven and blowing horns? Free is good.”

“Mary!” Sophia Russo shouted from the other side of the room, waving frantically at her daughter, an impatient look on her face. “Come on. The photographer is waiting.”

Dan was trapped between Sophia and Mary’s aunt Josephine, who was sniffing his coat sleeve and looking altogether too blissful. (Admittedly, Aunt Josie had a few problems.) He, on the other hand, wore the pathetic look of an abused, neglected puppy.

“You’d better go, kiddo. Dan’s in need of rescue, and I don’t want your mom accusing me of ruining your wedding by monopolizing all of your time.”

“Will we get a chance to talk again before I leave for the honeymoon?” Mary asked.

Annie shook her head, feeling sad at the thought that life as they knew it would be forever changed. “Not unless Dan wants to engage in a little ménage à trois tonight.” She smiled wickedly. “On second thought—”

“Annie Goldman, shame on you! This is my wedding day!” The bride did her best to look indignant, but she was laughing and couldn’t quite carry it off.

“Oy vey! I was only kidding. Now, go. Be happy.” Hugging her around the waist, Annie kissed Mary’s cheek, surprised by the tears suddenly flooding her eyes. She wasn’t a woman normally prone to tears. Annie had made a career out of hiding her vulnerability and the sorrow buried deep inside.

“Have a wonderful time in Venice, and a wonderful life with Dan. And call me when you get back. I want to hear all the pornographic details.”

From the other side of the room, where he stood next to the garish four-foot-tall silver champagne fountain that was spewing forth bubbly like an out-of-control geyser—that his mother had insisted they needed so his father wouldn’t come off looking cheap in front of the relatives, a major factor in any Italian social gathering—Joe observed Annie.

She was guiding Dan’s son, Matthew, onto the dance floor. The eight-year-old boy had been looking somewhat lost and left out during the festivities, and it was so like Annie to come to the child’s rescue.

Bending over, she bussed him on the cheek, and the kid’s face reddened before he wiped her kiss away with the back of his hand, making Joe grin. He could distinctly remember doing the very same thing when his mother’s sisters came to call. Aunt Josephine and Aunt Angie were big on kissing, pinching cheeks, and patting bottoms. The two women majored in mortification.

For all her tough exterior, Annie Goldman was a tenderhearted soul, a real soft touch. Though she’d be horrified to learn anyone thought so. She was also a woman who professed indifference, who liked playing it cool and detached.

But Joe knew otherwise. From the moment he’d taken Annie to her homecoming as a favor to Mrs. Goldman, who didn’t approve of the boys her daughter associated with, he realized she was someone special.

But that hadn’t always been the case.

Joe had been in his sophomore year of college and not at all thrilled by the idea of dating his little sister’s best friend, who was still in high school. He’d never really paid much attention to Annie Goldman while she was growing up, though she’d been at the house almost every day, hanging out with Mary and making his mother crazed.

She’d always been a little wild and unconventional, her clothing over the top. After all, how many teenagers dressed up as Rita Hayworth’s Gilda to go to homecoming?

Annie Goldman just wasn’t his type at all.

Or so he’d thought.

But Joe learned soon enough that there was substance beneath Annie’s flash and flamboyance. She was smart, funny, and could talk intelligently on any number of topics. And she was much more mature than the other girls her age.

He’d been drawn to her wit, infectious laugh, and very ample charms.

Annie had a body made for sin. And Joe, at twenty, had been ready and willing to break a few commandments.

There was a bit of the forbidden about Annie. Like Adam to Eve, he’d been lured by her blatant sexuality. He still wanted her, despite everything that had happened between them.

Loving Annie had been incredible, losing her unbearable. And he had only himself to blame.

Annie laughed at something the child was saying, and the husky, sensual sound drew Joe’s attention back to the present, skittering down his spine like a feather on bare skin.

Filling a glass with champagne, he took a sip, then gulped a great deal more when the woman began moving across the crowded floor, in his direction. Undulating, was more like it. Annie moved like a tidal wave, and he felt like a man going under for the very last time.

“Well, well, if it isn’t Father What-a-Hunk,” Annie said, arching a brow at the champagne glass in his hand. “Are you trying to drown your sorrows? That’s so unpriestlike. I’m actually quite shocked that you’re imbibing like the rest of us mere mortals, your holiness.” She failed to keep the animosity out of her voice, not that she tried very hard.

“Father what?” Joe asked, and she shook her head and moved to fill a glass for herself.

Though he was tempted to tell Annie of his decision to quit the church, he wouldn’t. Sophia was likely to go ballistic when she heard the news that her precious son, the priest, was turning in his clerical collar, and he wouldn’t let anything ruin his sister’s special day.

Mary’s decision to marry Dan Gallagher, the sportswriter-turned-restaurant-critic—the very man who had trashed her restaurant—had been an agonizing one.

Thanks to his mother’s overwhelming, controlling personality, all three of the Russo children had had issues to deal with while growing up. Mary’s was a fear of commitment and failure, and it had taken a great deal of persuading and patience on Dan’s part to bring the stubborn woman around to his way of thinking.

Of course, now that she was married and had taken over the role of mother to Dan’s son, Mary said she couldn’t think of a time when she’d ever objected to becoming the journalist’s wife.

And wasn’t it just like a woman to forget the important things in a relationship?

Flashing a smile in Annie’s direction to cover his discomfort, Joe said finally, “I drink communion wine all the time, so I guess you can’t call me a teetotaler.”

She shrugged. “Whatever. You did a nice job on the ceremony today. I was impressed with all the Latin you spewed forth, not that I understood a word of it.”

Her compliment took him by surprise. Annie had very little good to say about him these days. “It comes with the territory.”

Joe’s gaze drifted to the dance floor, where his parents were dancing, as was his sister Connie and her proctologist husband, Eddie Falcone, who took a great deal of ribbing from the Russo clan because of his medical specialty. Mary ungraciously referred to the poor guy as “the butt doctor.”

He didn’t miss the wistful smile crossing Annie’s lips as she watched the laughing couples crowding the dance floor. She loved to dance, to participate in anything having to do with music. “Would you like to join them?” he asked. “I’m a bit rusty, but I think I can manage without doing you serious injury.” He held his breath, wondering if she would take the olive branch he proffered.

Blue eyes widened at the invitation, then her cheeks warmed as she sipped more of the bubbly liquid while contemplating her answer. Finally, she said, “Why not. Even though the band sucks big-time, I’d hate for all that music to go to waste.” It was only a dance, after all.

“It won’t ruin your reputation to be seen dancing with a priest?” he asked, leading her onto the dance floor, a teasing smile hovering about his lips.

“I don’t give a f—a fig about my reputation. Or haven’t I made that clear over the years, Father Joseph? And since you’re dressed in a nice suit, instead of your holier-than-thou garments, I guess I’ll take my chances.”

They began moving about the floor to the romantic strains of a Frank Sinatra standard, and it didn’t take Annie long to become bewitched, bothered, and bewildered by Joe’s nearness. Though she hated to admit it, even to herself, it felt wonderful to be held in his arms again. It had been a long time.

Fifteen years was a very long time.

Cursing inwardly at where her thoughts had taken her, Annie decided that when the song ended she would make her excuses and drift off to the other side of the room, away from the man’s charms. The sexual attraction that had always existed between them was still as potent as ever, and she had no intention of repeating past mistakes.

“I was watching you when the bridal bouquet was tossed,” Joe said. “It was nice of you to pretend to miss it so our cousin Rosemary could catch it.” Tipping the scales at over two hundred and fifty pounds, poor Rosie needed all the help she could get. The overweight, unmarried woman hadn’t met a cannoli she didn’t like.

“I’m not looking to get hitched, so it wasn’t that great a sacrifice.”

“You’re a lot nicer than you give yourself credit for, Annie. I watched you with Dan’s boy earlier. You’re a natural as a . . .” he hesitated a moment, then whispered, “mother.”

White-hot pain stabbed into her breast, and she sucked in air, trying to maintain her indifference. “Speaking of mothers, yours has been giving me the evil eye, so I’d better go. I can’t afford to have any curses put on my head.”

Before she could make good her escape, the Paisans began playing a tarantella, and Joe latched on to her hand, dragging her into the circle of energetic Italians. They were clapping their hands above their heads and singing loud enough to raise the dead as they cavorted to the lively folk dance.

“Let me worry about my mother,” he told her when she started to protest again.

Someone thrust a tambourine at Annie, and she was soon banging it and singing as loudly as the rest of them, forgetting all about where she was, and whom she was with, as the magic of the music took hold.

“I am totally out of breath,” Annie admitted after the dance ended, clasping an open palm to her chest. “I can’t dance another step right now. But it was so much fun.”

Joe’s grin widened as she sucked in huge gulps of air. “And here I thought you were in shape from all those aerobic exercises you’re always doing.” Her tight, compact body gave testimony to that.

Concentrate on something else, he told himself, lifting his gaze to her mouth, to the fullness of her lush rose-petal lips, which proved to be an even bigger mistake. Annie had a mouth that fueled erotic dreams even a priest wasn’t immune to.

Pausing mid-breath, Annie shot him a look that would have withered lesser men. “I am in shape. And I haven’t heard any complaints from the other men here tonight.”

“And you’ll get none from me,” Joe said quickly, hoping to avoid an argument. “Come on, let’s go sing some karaoke. I’ve always wanted to try it.” There were a great many things he’d missed out on these past years, and he intended to rectify that, starting tonight.

Tonight was for new beginnings. He’d worry about the consequences tomorrow.

She looked at him as if he had suddenly become possessed. “What? Have you lost your mind? A priest singing karaoke? Your mother will faint dead away.”

Smiling in conspiratorial fashion, he winked. “That’s too good to pass up, don’t you think?” With a sigh of misgiving, she relented, allowing herself to be led up to the bandstand.

“I’m not singing, just as long as you know that.”

“I never took you for a chicken, Annie Goldman.”

“And I never took you for a jackass, Joseph Russo.”

Swallowing his smile, he settled her down onto a chair, told her to wait, and moved to talk to the guy in charge of the equipment.

A few moments later, Annie watched nervously as Joe grabbed the microphone and the screen before him lit. She had a bad feeling about this whole stupid idea. Then the music started playing, Joe began to sing, and she almost fell out of her chair.

“You fill up my senses . . .”

“Annie’s Song.” She sucked in her breath at the familiar strains of the John Denver classic. It was her song. The song Joe used to sing to her when they were dating—the song he had sung the first time they’d made love. A large lump lodged in her throat at the memories it conjured up.

Damn you, Joe! Damn you!

Cursing herself for her moment of weakness, she quickly regained control of her emotions.

“Come let me love you. Come love me again.”

In a pig’s eye! she thought, knowing that was never going to happen. Not again.

How could Joe do this to her? Didn’t he realize what that song meant to her? He was obviously more callous and unfeeling than she’d given him credit for.

Noting that several curious onlookers had gathered in front of the stage and were now staring at her with stupid smiles on their faces, as if she were the “luckiest girl in the whole USA,” to borrow a line from one of those hillbilly songs she detested, she felt trapped and angry.

Squirming restlessly in her seat, Annie wanted nothing more than to bolt. Except, that is, to kill Joseph Russo. That she wanted in the worst way.

Forcing a smile that was really more of a smirk, she kept her rage carefully hidden when he came to kneel down before her, and silently enumerated all the hideous things she was going to do to Joe when she got the chance.

Out of the corner of her eye, Annie caught Sophia Russo’s hateful glare. She was obviously furious at her son’s public display toward a woman she detested.

The woman’s anger almost made Annie’s pain bearable.

Almost.

But not quite.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

After winning awards for her delightful historical romances, author Millie Criswell has now turned her talents to contemporary fiction, whipping up delicious confections of romantic mischief filled with refreshing wit and charm. In What to do About Annie? a provocative game of revenge turns into a most unexpected date with destiny.

WHAT TO DO ABOUT ANNIE?

She’s outspoken and outrageous. She’s tired of swimming in the dating pool. And most of all, Annie Goldman has played bridesmaid for the last time. Of course no one would ever suspect that she still carries a torch for Joe Russo. Fourteen years ago, Joe ruined her with seductive promises of love and a future. That was right before he became a priest. But seeing Joe at her best friend’s wedding makes Annie realize: it’s time to forget Father What-A-Waste and grow up.

Even as a teenager, Annie had a body made for sin. And young Joe had been willing to break a few commandments. Now, more than a decade later, Joe is ready to quit the priesthood and is prepared to face the delectable woman he tried to pray out of his system. He wants her forgiveness–what he gets is an unholy torture that’s impossible to resist . . .

SYNOPSIS

She's outspoken and outrageous. She's tired of swimming the dating pool. And most of all, Annie Goldman has played bridesmaid for the last time. Of course no one would ever suspect that she still carries a torch for Joe Russo. Fourteen years ago, Joe ruined her with seductive promises of love and a future. That was right before he became a priest. But seeing Joe at her best friend's wedding makes Annie realize: it's time to forget Father What-A-Waste and grow up.

Even as a teenager, Annie had a body made for sin. And young Joe had been willing to break a few commandments. Now, more than a decade later, Joe is ready to quit the priesthood, prepared to face the delectable woman he tried to pray out of his system. He wants her forgiveness--what he gets is an unholy torture that's impossible to resist...

FROM THE CRITICS

Philadelphia Inquirer

This book is a gem. Very entertaining, lots of laughs and some tears.

Publishers Weekly

The eccentric Russo clan from Criswell's first contemporary romantic comedy, The Trouble With Mary, delights readers once again with their insatiable wit and boundless spirit. Criswell's dialogue is sharp and humorous, and her colorful characters liven up the narrative. Although Criswell is best known for her westerns, this is a tantalizing tale that her fans will eagerly embrace.

Rendevous

Ms. Criswell does it again with her latest romantic comedy which includes a cast of quirky secondary characters and a down-to-earth plot.

Suzanne Coleburn - Belles and Beaux of Romance

Millie Criswell is in her element and then some with What To Do About Annie? An uproariously funny romantic comedy that will have you laughing and loving from beginning to end at the wickedly inventive mischief Annie concocts to bring Joe to his knees. Millie Criswell's writing is simply brilliant! Romantic comedy is the perfect showcase for her extraordinary talent.

Carol Carter - Romance Reviews Today

I believe Ms. Criswell has found her niche as she writes romantic comedy like she was a natural for the genre. Her second contemporary sparkles with fun and laughter in her one-liners and Italian and Jewish characters. Pick up a copy of What To Do About Annie? as soon as it hits the shelves. You'll laugh often and love the ending. It's a real winner! Read all 6 "From The Critics" >

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