MAGGY'S CHILD

More paint-by-numbers romance for hard-core genre fans—the latest from the author of One Summer (1992) and Nobody's Angel (1992). Magdalena (aka Maggy) Garcia, a half-Mexican with unaccountably ``lily-white'' skin and red hair, has been trapped for over a decade in an abusive marriage (she stays, she insists, for the sake of son David). Then her gorgeous girlhood boyfriend, Nick, shows up in town. Maggy tries to fend him off, fearing the reprisals of psychotic—but rich—husband Lyle. But Nick soon realizes that Maggy is being abused, abducts her, and breaks down her defenses. After lots of formulaic sex (``He played her like a virtuoso with a prized violin''), Nick restores Maggy's old ``spitfire'' spirit. She responds by informing him that David is his son—a heavily foreshadowed disclosure. Nick stalks off, Lyle promptly steals Maggy back, and Nick saves her all over again. Meanwhile, Lyle drives a car over a cliff and tries to take Maggy with him. She survives to experience a brief idyll with David and Nick—until Lyle turns up, like the psycho killer in a B-movie, to kill Maggy and Nick and abduct David. The three survive eerily intact (Maggy sends David to a psychologist, who ``after one session...pronounced David a `remarkably resilient child'''), and unite for the happy end. A heavy-breathing, often redundant, one-note soaper.