Joan Wilder is a prolific romance novel writer based in New York. Although she could portray unbridled passion and all-consuming eroticism in her novels, she lives in a dull and dreary life in Manhattan. All that changed when she got a packaged from her dead brother-in-law and the strange thing about the package was that it came all the way from Columbia. Things turned topsy-turvy when Wilder's sister Elaine called her from Columbia and told Joan that unless she brings the package containing a map, her kidnappers will not release her. Like all compassionate heroines, Wilder flies off to Columbia to seek the release of her sister but instead got lost in Cartagena.
             Wilder's character is portrayed by Kathleen Turner, one of Hollywood's well known actresses and true to form, playing Wilder she presented herself as lost and unsure of in life and looking for something more or similar to her steamy novels. Joan Wilder is presented as someone wanting out of life what she can put to pen and paper but in real life it is so much different. Wilder is not your typical all-American pretty girl but her persona is that of someone not beautiful at first glance but whose beauty grows on you or her attractiveness comes out the longer you look at her. Her attraction lies in the deep character hidden in her being and the temperament comes mature in her novels but basically a passerby would immediately give an impression that Wilder is just one of the boring women you see everyday in downtown Manhattan.
             The New York scenes find Wilder dress in typical New York casual fashion but not overly haute couture and her clothing when she was in Cartagena seemed out of place and at times ragtag and soiled. Of course this is understandable considering with the heat, monsoon rains and tropical climate of the locale, any red-blooded American used to city living would find herself in squalor and irritated with extreme heat and extreme rains!
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