Today is my turn to share my Feature Post and Book Review for NOBODY’S AGENT (Ronin Nash Thriller Book #1) by Stuart Field on Overview Media Nobody’s Agent Blog Tour.
Below you will find a book description, my book review and the author’s bio. Enjoy!
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Book Description
In the Small town of Finchley, upstate New York, three bodies are discovered in an old mine. Soon after, Sheriff Doug Harrison contacts the FBI for help.
Ronin Nash is an ex-FBI special agent who wanted nothing more than to finish restoring the old family lake house. Now, Nash’s old boss wants him back and on the Finchley case.
Nash takes the job and travels to Finchley expecting to solve the case quickly, but it turns out that things are not not as clear-cut as he thought. Someone in the small town has a secret, and they’re willing to go to any lengths to protect it.
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My Book Review
RATING: 5 out of 5 Stars
NOBODY’S AGENT (Ronin Nash Thrillers Book #1) by Stuart Field is an exciting and captivating start to a new thriller series featuring an unconventional ex-FBI agent. The main character and crime plot grabbed me from page one.
After a case ends badly, FBI agent Ronin Nash resigns and heads off to his family’s cabin on a lake in the woods, but after a year his former boss comes to ask him to return for one special case for the new IIB (Interagency Investigation Bureau). Reluctant, but with a mind that is always intrigued with mysteries, Ronin accepts.
Finchley is a small town in upstate New York. After the sheriff discovers three bodies in an old, abandoned mine, he notifies the FBI for their assistance. This is the case Ronin is to investigate. Hopefully, it will be one day there and then he can either dismiss it back to local law enforcement or discover reasons for the FBI to take the case. A local reporter is missing, and an unidentified dead body is discovered in the old clothing factory. Ronin is learning this small town is full of secrets that could end up getting him killed.
I loved Ronin. He is the type of main character I love to find in thrillers with his intelligence, unique personality, and style. He puts all the evidence together while others underestimate his abilities. The secondary characters were believable, and I especially enjoyed Ronin’s dad, Mac. The dialogue between the two made for some lighter moments. The plot moves at a fast pace throughout the story with many surprising twists along the way. Mr. Field has a writing style that allowed me to fall right into this story and not want to stop reading until the resolution. I am very glad this is a series, and I will be anxiously waiting for the next Ronin Nash thriller.
I highly recommend this new thriller!
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Author Bio
Stuart Field is a British Army veteran who now works in security after serving twenty-two years in the British Army. As well as working full time he writes in his spare time. Stuart was born and raised in the West Midlands in the UK. His love for travel has been an inspiration in some of his work with his John Steel and Ronin Nash thriller series. As well as future John Steel novels, Stuart is working on a new series and standalone novels.
Today I am sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for DEPTHS OF DECEIT (A Jamie Rush Mystery Book #2) by Laura Oles on this Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tour.
Below you will find a book description, my book review, an excerpt from the book, the author’s bio and social media links and a Rafflecopter giveaway. Enjoy!
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Book Description
One deadly secret.
No time to lose.
PI Jamie Rush has her hands full with small-time skip-tracing and surveillance jobs in Port Alene, Texas. The work is steady, though she still struggles to make ends meet. But when her partner, Cookie, brings in a low-paying and potentially time-consuming case, Jamie takes it on out of loyalty.
Cookie’s childhood friend, Renata, needs to find her younger sister, Leah. As Jamie digs into Leah’s past, it becomes clear that the missing woman’s life was shrouded in secrets, the kind that could jeopardize those involved in the case.
To complicate matters, PI Alastair Finn has returned, and he’s willing to reclaim his town by any means necessary. Jamie has never been one to retreat, and Alastair enjoys a good fight. Sparks will fly.
A missing woman. Felonies. Finn’s return. Every twist reminds Jamie that she’s still an outsider in this town. Jamie must prove herself all over again, and the stakes have never been higher.
Genre: Mystery, Female PI Published by: Red Adept Publishing Publication Date: May 31, 2022 Number of Pages: 292 Series: A Jamie Rush Mystery, #2
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My Book Review
RATING: 4 out of 5 Stars
DEPTHS OF DECEIT (A Jamie Rush Mystery Book #2) by Laura Oles is a character focused and driven mystery in this series featuring P.I. Jamie Rush and her sidekick Cookie Hinojosa set in the coastal town of Port Alene, Texas. While this mystery can be read as a standalone, I feel it would be more enjoyable if “Daughters of Bad Men” were read first due to evolving character arcs.
P.I. Jamie Rush agrees to take on a case for Cookie even though there is no guarantee of payment for time involved. Cookie’s childhood friend, Renata needs to find her younger sister, Leah but as they begin to investigate, they discover more secrets than they anticipated.
To complicate Jamie’s life even more, P.I. Alastair Finn has returned to Port Alene.
I enjoy this type of P.I. mystery which is character forward and not step-by-step procedural investigation if done right, and this one is. The plot is a steady pace throughout except for the faster paced climax. The dialogue and banter between the characters is entertaining and believable. The coastal town of Port Alene, Texas comes to life in this story and adds to the immersive feeling while reading the story.
This is an entertaining cast of characters that I am looking forward to following in the future.
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Excerpt
Depths of Deceit
A Jamie Rush Mystery #2
By Laura Oles
The mermaid in the truck bed was what caught Jamie Rush’s attention. The cast-iron figure peeked over the hatch, her carved, flowing hair and demure smile in view. This was supposed to be a standard identify-and-repo job. Jamie was certain she hadn’t seen a mermaid on the itemized paperwork. Brody Rutger, in addition to hiding from creditors, had added theft of a local celebrity to his resume.
The day had started strong, with a lead on Rutger and an opportunity to catch him between fishing charters, using a boat he’d quit paying on months before. Suddenly, Marian the Mermaid was caught up in the mix.
And something was going on with the weather.
The month of November normally brought a steady stream of long-term vacationers from the north—affectionally called Winter Texans—who fled harsh winters for the promise of more tepid temperatures. Those who’d already set up residence in Port Alene were likely to be disappointed. Port A, usually quite predictable in her warmth, had suddenly changed her mind. That day, she was trading humidity for frigid air, and the wind, once laced with a warm, salty breeze, was offering only a cold shoulder. The palm trees lining Island Main bristled from side to side, and the town seemed to have turned inward in response. The icy wind whistled in the gap of her Tahoe’s window.
Jamie shuddered at the weather’s frigid downturn, while her partner, Cookie Hinojosa, all but cursed Mother Nature. He believed anything under seventy degrees was downright blasphemous. Jamie tilted her head toward the gray sky and welcomed the sting of air on her cheeks, her head briefly popping out the driver’s-side window. Cookie glanced over and shook his head. “
You’re very grumpy this morning,” Jamie said. She gave him a once-over, taking note of the large Dallas Cowboys logo on his chest, the silver star claiming almost all the space between his shoulders. “I see you found your favorite winter hoodie. Probably more fun to wear when they’re winning.”
Cookie turned to her and scowled. “Et tu, Brute? You’re going to dump on our favorite team? Really?”
Jamie reached over and gave her partner’s meaty shoulder a squeeze. “They need to earn our love by playing better. And we’ve been damned patient.” She rubbed her hand up and down his sleeve, noting the fabric felt cold. “You should probably break down and buy a proper winter jacket.”
“This is South Texas. Only snowbirds wear ‘proper’ winter jackets.”
Cookie dismissed the idea of wearing anything that added additional bulk to his substantial frame. “My Hawaiian shirts are sad from neglect.”
She had to agree. A long-sleeved Hawaiian shirt would look ridiculous on anyone. She rubbed her hands together and hoped the cold snap would soon dissipate, returning the balmy temperatures Port Alene normally delivered.
“I’m going to pull back a bit,” Jamie said.
Their skip of the day, Brody Rutger, owed their client, AAA Repo Services, $15,027. Brody had ducked all attempts at collection, so Jamie and Cookie had been hired to locate him and return the boat. Jamie and Cookie specialized in skip tracing, which essentially meant finding people who didn’t want to be found. They worked skips but also some surveillance—which paid well but was boring beyond belief—and some divorce cases, which also paid well but renewed Jamie’s resolve to never get married. In Jamie’s experience, if a person disappeared, the reasons involved money, private information, or violence. And secrets—always a secret.
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Author Bio
Laura Oles is the Agatha-nominated and award-winning author of the Jamie Rush mystery series, along with short stories and nonfiction. With two decades of experience in the digital photography industry, Laura’s work has appeared in trade and consumer magazines, crime-fiction anthologies, and she served as a business columnist. Laura loves road trips, bookstores and any outdoor activity that doesn’t involve running. She lives in the Texas Hill Country with her family.
Today I am excited to be sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for BECOMING FAMILY (Dogwood County Book #3) by Elysia Whisler on this HTP Books August 2022 Romance Blog Tour. I have anxiously been waiting for this next book in this series.
Below you will find a book summary, my book review, an excerpt from the book and the author’s bio and social media links. Enjoy!
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Book Summary
Contemporary romance for fans of Jill Shalvis and Lori Foster, returning to the characters of the Dogwood County series, Book 3 follows Tabitha Steele as she plans to have her best year ever.
On her thirtieth birthday, Tabitha realizes she hasn’t much to show for her life since she left military service. Tabitha makes a hasty vow that she will make this the best year of her life, which is a tall order considering her mish-mash of unfulfilling jobs, her stagnant social life, and the crippling PTSD she has to overcome on a near-daily basis. But she thinks she can do it with the help of her beloved service dog, Trinity.
Chris Hobbs, the playful and wild-hearted bad boy of the Semper Fit gym, is Tabitha’s complete opposite. Which is why, despite his habit of dating any woman who bats an eye at him, he’s always steered clear of Tabitha, even though they’ve formed a tight friendship. Especially because of that.
BECOMING FAMILY (Dogwood County Book #3) by Elysia Whisler is another wonderful addition to this contemporary romance series featuring a community of veterans from all branches of service, their families, friends, and service animals. These books can be read as standalone romances, but the entire community of characters and their relationships continue to evolve in each consecutive story, so I feel they are best read in order.
Tabitha Steele has decided on her thirtieth birthday to take charge of her life and do what she really wants instead of just getting by. She feels she is better at handling her PTSD with her service dog, Trinity and now it is time to accomplish some goals to move her career and personal life forward.
Chris Hobbs is the flirty and playful coach at Semper Fit. He always keeps things light and his relationships short, but something about the timid Tabitha pulls at him and he wants to help her discover her strengths. With the sudden death of his abusive father, Chris must face his own past and decide if he is willing to allow Tabitha to see the vulnerable person behind the mask.
I love this series so much. I have been waiting for Chris to meet his match and I just knew there was more than met the eye with this hero. Tabitha at first seemed too timid to take on Chris, but Ms. Whisler expertly turned the tables with Tabitha being stronger than she believed and Chris covering up more than his “good ole boy” persona let on. I also enjoy how all the characters from previous stories, and I am sure more stories to come are a family by choice and play helpful roles in the current featured couple’s journey to their HEA. I love all the pets and service animals intertwine throughout these stories and especially the pitties, my favorite dogs. This book has everything I love about a great contemporary romance and that it is a series is like having a cherry on the top.
I highly recommend this romance, this series, and this author!
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Excerpt
ONE
Tabitha’s radar was lit before the woman even entered the store. The way she whipped into the parking space, killed the engine at a crooked angle and jangled the bell over the shop door like it was being throttled. Tabitha had just taken a bite of the Really Big Cookie—a birthday indulgence bought at the community college cafeteria—when the woman marched right up to the front counter and, without so much as hello, slapped down some pictures. “My father’s old Harley has been sitting in the barn for decades,” she declared, out of breath. “And I’m determined to get it going.”
Tabitha closed up her Journal of Invincibility—I am not afraid; I was born to do this. ~Joan of Arc—and tucked it behind the counter, like a mother protecting her young. The woman went on for a bit, while Tabitha tried to chew and swallow her treat. When she was done ranting, she stood there in silence. Eventually, she shook her head. “Don’t you know anything about motorcycles?” Big-breasted, big-hipped, big personality, big, brassy red hair, the customer rested her elbow on the counter and leaned against it, settling in.
“Not much, no.” A hunk of cookie fell from Tabitha’s lips and landed on the front of her Triple M Classics employee T-shirt. She hastily brushed it away and gestured to the shelves that lined the rear of the shop. “I just ring up the merchandise. Keep tabs on the floor when the mechanics are in the back.” She closed her eyes and rubbed her temples, but that just prompted images from school this morning, which she didn’t want in her head. Still, with her eyes closed, Tabitha sensed that this wasn’t really about the motorcycle. The woman was upset, possibly grieving. The motorcycle meant something to her and she wanted quick answers because she was searching for a way to ease her pain. Tabitha opened her eyes again, looked past the woman and settled her gaze on Trinity, the little black rescue pit bull who always made her feel better.
“Then get the mechanic. Or, better yet, get the owner. Where’s Delaney Monroe?”
“She’s on an errand.” Tabitha kept her gaze on Trinity, who lay near the stairs that led to Delaney’s apartment. She was catching some zees in the dog bed intended for Delaney’s dog, Wyatt. For about the third time that day Tabitha thought, What am I doing here? I’m not cut out for this.
“Delaney Monroe is who I came to see,” the woman pressed. “I heard she’s an expert on classic bikes. If you work in a bike shop, you should know about bikes. I don’t have time for this.” She straightened up and planted her hands on her hips.
“Delaney’s out. Maybe I can help.”
Tabitha turned to the sound of Nora’s raspy voice.
“I’m Nora. One of the mechanics.” Delaney’s mom had come out of the back room, wiping grease from her fingers with a shop rag. She had a cigarette tucked behind her ear, right where her temples were starting to gray. The rest of her hair was silky black and tied back in a ponytail. Nora was a small woman with a slight build, but the way she carried herself, she might as well have been six feet tall. She wore blue jeans and the same Triple M Classics T-shirt and she locked her fearless, almond-shaped eyes into the irritated gaze of the customer. “Whatcha got?” She nodded at the photographs.
The woman pushed them across the countertop. “This has been in my father’s barn for ages. He recently passed and I’m not sure if it’s worth fixing up.”
Nora went silent while she leafed through the pictures. “An old Harley Panhead,” she murmured. “Sweet. Do you know the year? Looks like a ’49.”
“Yes. How did you know that?”
Tabitha felt a shift in the air as the woman’s demeanor changed, her anger melting away, relief softening her shoulders and her scrunched-up mouth. Crisis averted.
“The window on a Panhead is only ’48 to ’65. The emblem on the gas tank in this shot tells me it’s a ’49.” Nora tapped the top photo with her grease-stained finger.
The woman stuck out her hand, a huge grin on her face. “Nelly Washington. Nice to meet you.”
“Nora.” Nora glanced at Nelly’s hand but didn’t touch her. “My girl owns this place.”
“I’ve heard good things.”
“Damn straight you heard good things. My girl’s the best.”
Nelly gave off a deep belly laugh and used the humor as an excuse to withdraw her unrequited handshake. “Can she fix it up? Make it run?”
Like a cowgirl walking into a saloon in an old Western, Delaney pushed open the shop door at that moment. The bell jangled as she strode inside, motorcycle boots thunking over the floor, helmet in her gloved hand. Delaney was taller than her mother by several inches, had the same slender build and dark hair, but in a pixie cut. Wyatt, the wandering white pit bull with the brown eye patch, trotted in next to her, still wearing his Doggles. Delaney slipped the eye protection off her motorcycle-riding companion. Wyatt spotted Trinity on his dog bed and raced over to play. He leaned on his front paws, butt in the air, tail wagging, then jumped backward and spun. When that didn’t work, he danced all around her, flipping his head and poking his muzzle in the air. Trinity, unmoved, looked to Tabitha for instruction.
“Break, Trinity,” Tabitha said, and the dogs were soon twining necks like ponies.
Nora waved at her daughter and shrugged at Nelly. “You’ll need to bring the bike in. See what’s up. Is it dry?”
“Been in the shed. Covered up.” Nelly’s gaze went to Delaney as she neared.
“She means did you drain the carburetor and gas tank,” Delaney clarified, settling her helmet on the counter. “Before you stored it.”
“Oh.” Nelly’s face went straight. “I don’t know, actually. My father is the one who stored it. Once his arthritis got too bad for him to ride.”
“That’ll make a difference,” Delaney continued, like she’d been in on the conversation from the beginning. “That, and how straight the bike was when it was put up.” She glanced at the photos. “A ’49 Panhead. Cool. Bring it in. We’ll take a look.”
“I will definitely do that. Thank you. My father recently passed away. He used to take me on rides on that bike when I was a little girl.” Nelly’s voice grew faraway, wistful. “We’d go to the general store and he’d buy me a grape soda. I loved feeling the wind in my hair.” Nelly waved a hand. “This was before helmet laws. Anyway.” The reminiscent look in Nelly’s eyes slid away and she sniffed deeply. “Are you Delaney?”
“Yes, ma’am. Don’t worry. I’ve never met a Panhead I can’t get going.”
Tabitha stuffed the rest of the cookie in her mouth and tried to sneak away, her lack of motorcycle knowledge no longer an issue. Her shift was over, she was exhausted and she was ready to go home.
“Get back here, Steele.” Delaney grasped the hem of Tabitha’s shirt and pulled her back gently. “You need to take down this lady’s information. The more you listen, the more you’ll learn. Pretty soon you’ll know a Harley Panhead on sight.” Delaney nodded at Tabitha. “She’s still learning.”
“She seems like a nice young lady.” Nelly was all smiles now, like their earlier interaction had never happened.
After Tabitha filled out a capture sheet with Nelly Washington’s information, and the woman had left the shop in an entirely different mood than the one she’d barged in with, Delaney turned to her and said, “What’s going on, Steele? You look ready to lie on the floor and call your dog for Smoosh Time.”
Smoosh Time was Delaney’s slang for the deep pressure therapy Trinity was trained to provide if Tabitha was having a panic attack. It was affectionate rather than sarcastic. Unused to affection, Tabitha liked it and had taken to calling the therapy Smoosh Time herself. Smoosh Time actually sounded really good about now. But Trinity was still on break, chasing Wyatt around the perimeter of the shop. “It’s been a long day.”
“Massage school getting you down?”
“Old Nelly was kinda rough on her,” Nora offered. She slipped the cigarette from behind her ear and stuck it between her lips.
“That’s why she’s learning as much as she can.” Delaney tapped the capture sheet. “That’s all you can do, Steele. I don’t expect you to become a mechanic, unless you want to, but you soak in everything you can while you’re here.” She glanced at her mother. “Don’t you dare light that in here, Nora.”
Nora pulled it from her lips and rolled her eyes. “I’m not. It’s just a prop, okay?”
“How many days has it been?” After some hemming and hawing Delaney clarified, “For real.”
“Half a day,” Nora admitted. “I’d gone two days and then I caved this morning. It’s so hard not to smoke after I eat. Maybe I need to stop eating.”
Delaney shook her head. “You gotta be tough, Nora. Like Tabitha here.”
“I’m not tough.” Tabitha had been enjoying watching the mother-daughter pair interact, despite how rough her day had been so far. They made her wonder what her relationship with her birth mother would’ve been like, if she’d known her. Tabitha’s relationship with Auntie El—the woman who’d raised her and the only mother Tabitha had ever known—was as old-fashioned as it got. Yes, ma’am, No, ma’am, please and thank you, respect your elders and all boundaries clearly drawn and rarely crossed. There was none of this role reversal or sarcastic banter. Life certainly hadn’t been easy, and Tabitha had been handed absolutely nothing. If that didn’t make her tough, nothing would. “Tough is just not my nature.”
Sensitive was Tabitha’s nature, for good or bad. The armor she lacked had never been very useful, not until she joined the navy and her main job in Afghanistan was to protect her chaplain from harm. She’d been pretty good at smelling trouble, hearing things nobody else heard, seeing things nobody else saw. Some had even jokingly called her Radar, after the character from M*A*S*H. It made her good at her job, despite the fact that she hadn’t been able to prevent the IED that had got her chaplain hurt, and despite the fact that the skill was kind of useless, and often counterintuitive, in everyday life.
“You’re tough-ish, Tabitha,” Nora agreed. “Which means you got potential. Just gotta stand up for yourself with lippy women like Nelly.”
“Spill it, Steele.” Delaney shot her mother a silencing look. “What’s going on?”
“You were right, Sarge,” Tabitha admitted. She hadn’t planned on discussing her day, but there was just something about Delaney, the woman she’d met at Camp Leatherneck years ago. The woman who’d helped her keep her head straight during that awful day when an IED had taken out her convoy. “It’s massage school.”
“What about it?”
“It’s the student exchanges.” Tabitha drew a deep breath. “We have to swap with our classmates once a week to practice the strokes we learn in class. At first, I was doing really well. Everyone loved my massages and said that I just had that magic touch. But then…well… I’m doing something wrong. I’m not…massaging right.” Tabitha bit down on her lower lip.
“How can you not massage right?” Nora spoke around the unlit cigarette dangling from her lips. “Aren’t you just squirting lotion on each other? How hard can that be?”
“No. We’re not just squirting lotion. It’s a lot more than that.” Tabitha was used to Nora’s directness at this point, and did her best to not let Delaney’s mother get under her skin. “You have to learn all the bones and muscles and physiology. Plus all the strokes. There’s a lot of science. You have to learn about how the body moves and how everything works together. And then you have to massage in such a way that you’re helping people. And right now, I’m not helping anyone.” Just like she hadn’t been able to help Nelly Washington with her Panhead. Tabitha wasn’t helping anyone, anywhere.
She was an impostor in every aspect of her own life.
Nora pulled a Zippo from her pocket and flipped it open. “How do you know?” She ran her thumb over the wheel, making a clicking sound with the lighting mechanism without actually bringing the flame to life.
“I’m…” Tabitha sighed and faced the blank expressions of the women. “I’m giving the men erections.”
A round of silence passed.
“I’ve done it three times now, to three different men. So it’s not like a one-off. I’m doing something wrong.”
“Man,” Delaney said, shaking her head. “It’s always the quiet ones.”
Wyatt gave off a loud woof and everyone burst into laughter.
“Well.” Nora stuck the cigarette behind her ear and jammed the lighter in the front pocket of her jeans. “Au contraire, but I bet those men think you’re doing something right.”
“We’re definitely not supposed to get erections,” Tabitha insisted. All three men had reacted differently. Todd—young, indifferent, thought massage therapy would be an easy career field—had pretended it didn’t happen. Frank—in his forties, quiet, deliberate—had been embarrassed and would no longer make eye contact with Tabitha in class. Corbin—a loud twentysomething who called everyone dude—had eyed his own erection with detached interest and announced, “You’re doing something wrong, dude.”
Delaney shook her head. “Men are just like that. The wind blows and their dicks get hard. I wouldn’t be so down on yourself.”
“I already struggle with the science. Like right now we’re learning all the bones, with all their divots and ridges and stuff. It’s excruciating and not coming easily to me,” Tabitha said. “And now I’m screwing up the massages. I’m starting to think I’m just not cut out for it.” Just like I’m not cut out for this bike shop, she didn’t add. She already knew Delaney had given her the job out of pity. No need to shine a spotlight.
“Sounds like the bones are coming easily to you,” Nora muttered as she collected today’s paperwork from the counter and started to file it away. “You’ll be the most requested massage girl in the county. I don’t see what the big problem is.”
Delaney stifled a laugh. “Don’t listen to her. Ask Red about it later. We have the Halloween party, remember?”
The party. Tabitha died a little inside. “Right. The party. Tonight.” But Delaney was right. Tonight she could ask Constance, “Red” for short, the famous massager of humans and dogs alike, about the erections. See what advice she had to give. She’d been the one to talk Tabitha into massage school in the first place, claiming Tabitha had a gift for connecting with people. She was connecting, all right. Just not in the way she meant to.
Delaney grinned and slapped her on the shoulder. “Go home and get some Smoosh Time with your dog, Steele. Rest up. We’ll figure out the boners later.”
Elysia Whisler is the author of RESCUE YOU and other coming titles in the Dogwood County series. She was raised in Texas, Italy, Alaska, Mississippi, Nebraska, Hawai’i and Virginia, in true military fashion. Her nomadic life made storytelling a compulsion from a young age. Her work as a massage therapist and a CrossFit trainer informs her stories. She lives in Virginia with her family, including her large brood of cat and dog rescues, who vastly outnumber the humans.
Today I am Sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for EDGE OF DUSK by Colleen Coble on this Partners In Crime Virtual Book Tour.
Below you will find a book description, my book review, an excerpt from the book, the author’s bio and social media links and a Kingsumo giveaway. Good luck on the giveaway and enjoy!
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Book Description
Even though secrets lie off the coast of Rock Harbor, the truth will set Annie Pederson free—if it doesn’t kill her first.
Nine-year-old Annie Pederson’s life changed the night her sister was kidnapped. The two had been outside playing on a dock, and Annie never forgave herself for her role in her sister’s disappearance. Twenty-four years later and now a law enforcement ranger, Annie is still searching for answers as she grieves a new loss: the death of her husband and parents in a boating accident.
But Annie and her eight-year-old daughter, Kylie, aren’t the only people in the town of Rock Harbor whose lives have been marred by tragedy. While managing the property around the Tremolo Resort and Marina she inherited, Annie discovers a dead body floating in the cold Superior surf and begins to work with the sheriff’s office to tie the death to a series of other mysterious reports in the area.
At the same time, her first love, Jon Dustan, returns after nine years away, reigniting the town’s memory of a cold case he’d been suspiciously linked to before he left to pursue his orthopedic residency. For the sake of her investigation and her heart, Annie tries to stay away. But avoiding Jon becomes impossible once Annie realizes she is being targeted by someone desperate to keep secrets from the past hidden.
In this new series, bestselling romantic-suspense author Colleen Coble returns to one of her most beloved towns, where familiar faces—and unsolved cases—await.
Genre: Romantic Suspense Published by: Thomas Nelson Publication Date: July 12th 2022 Number of Pages: 352 ISBN: 078525370X (ISBN13: 9780785253709) Series: Annie Pederson #1
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My Book Review
RATING: 3.5 out of 5 Stars
EDGE OF DUSK (An Annie Pederson Novel Book #1) by Colleen Coble is the start of a new suspense series featuring a female ranger with romantic and Christian elements. This book has some characters carried over from Ms. Coble’s other books set in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, but I did not feel as though I needed any back story or was missing anything.
Annie Penderson was only nine-year-old when she and her younger sister, Laura were attacked as children. Annie was stabbed and left for dead while Laura was kidnapped from the dock of their Upper Peninsula home and never found. Twenty-four years later, Annie is a LEO ranger who still feels guilty for not protecting her sister and continues to search for her, while also being a single mother after the boating accident which killed both her husband and her parents.
While maintaining on the side the Tremolo Resort and Marina her parents left her, Annie finds a dead floating by the docks. It is the body of a missing hiking/camper, and he is not the first in the area to go missing.
At the same time, Dr. Jon Dustan returns to the area to sell his family’s summer cabin after his father’s stroke. Jon was Annie first love, but after a fight that tore them apart and suspicions from long ago tying him to two missing girls, he left the area for college. Annie wants to protect her heart, but when the missing girls’ bodies are discovered in an old cabin on the resort lands, it throws the two together again in hopes of solving the mystery once and for all.
This book has a lot happening in multiple plot lines. Some questions are answered in this book and others are set up to be continued in future books in the series. I liked the multiple mysteries and trying to figure out if they were connected or not. I did not feel the ending of the missing hikers/campers case was believable especially when you discover who else was complicit in the cover-up. I am interested enough to continue with the series to discover other solutions to the unsolved mysteries though. The Christian elements were minimal. The romantic elements had a few problems for me. I do not like when a misunderstanding lasts for almost an entire story, when the two supposed grown-ups can sit down and discuss their feelings sooner. This made it difficult for me to really connect with Annie and Jon who appear to be carrying this series forward.
Overall, this was an OK start to this new series. It has a few problems for me, but I do want to continue reading to discover where the cliff-hanger to one of the many mysteries leads.
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Excerpt
PROLOGUE
“WAS THAT THE WINDIGO?” NINE-YEAR-OLD ANNIE
Vitanen yanked her little sister’s hand to pull her to a stop in the deep shadows of the pines. Chills trickled down her spine, and she stared into the darkness. “Did you hear that?”
“It was just the loons,” Sarah said. “Daddy said there’s no such thing as the Windigo.”
Annie shuddered. “You’re only five—you don’t know that.” While at school she’d heard the story about the fifteen-foot- tall monster who ate humans. Annie peered into the shadows, searching for sunken red eyes in a stag skull staring back at her. The Windigo particularly liked little girls to fill its hungry belly. Sarah tugged her hand free. “Daddy said it was just an old Ojibwa legend. I want to see the loons.”
She took off down the needle-strewn path toward the water.
Annie’s heart seized in her throat. “Sarah, wait!”
Daddy had always told Annie she was responsible for her little sister, and she didn’t want to get in trouble when their parents found out they were out here in the dark. Sarah had begged to come out to see the loons, and Annie found it hard to say no to her. This was the first time they’d been to their little camp on Tremolo Island since the summer started, and it might be a long time before they had time to visit again. Daddy only brought them to get away when he had a lull at the marina. Annie loved it here, even if there wasn’t any power.
Her legs pumped and her breath whooshed in and out of her mouth. She emerged into the moonlight glimmering over Lake Superior. Her frantic gaze whipped around, first to make sure the Windigo hadn’t followed them, then to find her sister.
Sarah sat on the wooden dock with her legs dangling over the waves. Lightning flickered in the distance, and Annie smelled rain as it began to sprinkle. Clouds hung low over the water, and the darkness got thicker.
“We need to go back, Sarah.” While they could still find their way in the storm.
“I want to throw bread to the loons.” Sarah gave her a piece of the bread they’d gotten from the kitchen.
Annie jumped when the loon’s eerie yodel sounded. The oo-AH-ho sound was like no other waterfowl or bird. Normally she loved trying to determine whether the loon was yodeling, wailing, or calling, but right now she wanted to get her sister back into bed before they got in big trouble. They both knew better than to come down here by themselves. Mommy had warned them about the dangers more times than Annie could count.
She touched her sister’s shoulder. “Come on, Sarah.”
Sarah shrugged off her hand. “Just a minute. Look, the loon has a baby on its back.”
Annie had to see that. She threw in a couple of bread pieces and peered at the loons. “I’ve never seen that.”
“Me neither.”
The loons didn’t eat the bread, but she giggled when a big fish gulped down a piece right under their feet.
When she first heard the splashing, she thought it signaled more loons. But wait. Wasn’t that the sound of oars slapping the water? A figure in a dark hoodie sat in the canoe. Did the Windigo ride in a canoe?
The canoe bumped the dock, and a voice said, “Two to choose from. It doesn’t get much better than that.”
The voice was so cheerful, Annie wasn’t afraid. Before she could try to identify who it was, a hard hand grabbed her and dragged her into the canoe. “I think the younger one would be better.”
The sudden, sharp pain in Annie’s neck made her cry out, and she slapped her hand against her skin. Something wet and sticky clung to her fingers. In the next instant, she was in the icy water. The shock of the lake’s grip made her head go under.
She came up thrashing in panic and spitting water. Her legs wouldn’t kick very well, and she felt dizzy and disoriented. She tried to scream for Daddy, but her mouth wouldn’t work. Her neck hurt something awful, and she’d never felt so afraid.
She’d been right—it was the Windigo, and he meant to eat her sister.
“Sarah!” Annie’s voice sounded weak in her ears, and the storm was here with bigger waves churning around her. “Run!”
Her sister shrieked out her name, and Annie tried to move toward the sound, but a wave picked her up and tossed her against a piling supporting the dock. Her vision went dark, and she sank into the cold arms of the lake.
The next thing she knew, she was on her back, staring up into the rain pouring into her face. Her dad’s hand was on the awful pain in her neck, and her mother was screaming for Sarah.
She never saw her sister again.
ONE
TWENTY-FOUR YEARS LATER
LAW ENFORCEMENT RANGER ANNIE PEDERSON RUBBED
her eyes after staring at the computer screen for the past two hours. She’d closed the lid on an investigation into a hit-and-run in the Kitchigami Wilderness Preserve, and she’d spent the past few hours finishing paperwork. It had been a grueling case, and she was glad it was over.
“I’ll be right back,” she told her eight-year-old daughter, Kylie, sitting on the floor of her office playing Pokémon Go on her iPad.
Kylie’s blonde head, so like Annie’s own, bobbed, too intent to respond verbally.
Kade Matthews looked up when Annie entered his office. Over the past few years he’d moved up and become head ranger. Kade’s six-feet-tall stocky frame and solid muscles exuded competence, and his blue eyes conveyed caring. Annie thanked the Lord every day for such a good boss. He was understanding when she needed time off with Kylie, and he let her know he valued her work and expertise. “Ready for a few days off?”
“Really? With all this work on your shoulders?”
He nodded. “I can handle it. I know this is a busy time for you.”
“I do have a lot of work to do out at the marina.”
Since her parents and husband died two years ago, she’d been tasked with running the Tremolo Marina and Cabin Resort. She managed with seasonal help and lots of her free time, but summer was always grueling. It was only June 3, and the season was off to a good start.
He cleared his throat, and his eyes softened. “I’m glad you stopped in. I didn’t want to send this report without talking to you first.”
“What report?” Her tongue felt thick in her mouth because she knew the likely topic.
“A child’s remains were found down around St. Ignace.”
It didn’t matter that it was so far. That route could have easily been chosen by the kidnapper. It was a common way to travel from lower Michigan to the U.P. “How old?”
“Five or six, according to the forensic anthropologist. I assume you want your DNA sent over for comparison?”
“Yes, of course.”
They’d been through this scenario two other times since she’d begun searching for answers, and each time she’d teetered between hope and despair. While she wanted closure on what had happened to her sister, she wasn’t sure she was ready to let go of hope. Though logically she knew her sister had to be dead. People didn’t take children except for nefarious purposes. Annie didn’t know how she’d react when word finally came that Sarah had been found.
Relief? Depression? Maybe a combination of the two. Maybe even a tailspin that would unhinge her. All these years later, and she still couldn’t think about that night without breaking into a cold sweat. Avoidance had been her modus operandi. Not many even knew about the incident. Kade did, of course. And Bree. Jon too. Probably some of the townspeople remembered and talked about it, too, but it had been long ago. Twenty-four years ago.
Nearly a quarter of a century and yet just yesterday. “How long before results are back on DNA?”
“Probably just a few days. With children they try to move quickly. I’ll get it sent over. You doing okay?”
She gave a vigorous nod. “Sure, I’m fine. I’ll file this report and get these pictures sent to you.”
“Bree told me to ask if you wanted a puppy, one of Samson’s.
There’s a male that looks just like him.”
She smiled just thinking of her daughter’s delight. “Kylie has been begging for a puppy since we lost Belle. How much are they going for?”
The little terrier had died in her sleep a month ago at age sixteen, and they both missed her. Samson was a world-renowned search-and-rescue dog, and his pups wouldn’t come cheap. She ran through how much she had in savings. Maybe not enough.
“We get two free pups, and Bree told me she would give you one.” “You don’t want to do that,” she protested. “You’d be giving up a lot of money.”
He shrugged. “We have everything we need. Head over there in the next few days, and you can take him home with you before our kids get too attached and bar the front door.”
She laughed. “Hunter says he’s marrying Kylie, so I think he will stick up for her.”
Kade and Bree’s little boy was four and adored Kylie. She was good with kids, and she loved spending time with the Matthews twins.
“You’re right about that. I’ll let Bree know you want him. He’s a cute little pup.”
“What are you doing with the other one?” “Lauri has claimed her.”
Kade’s younger sister was gaining a reputation for search-and- rescue herself, and she already had a dog. “What about Zorro?”
“He’s developed diabetes, and Lauri knows he needs to slow down some. She wants a new puppy to train so Zorro can help work with him.”
“She might want the one that looks like Samson.” “She wants a female this time.”
She glanced at her watch and rose. “I’ll get out of here. Thanks again for the puppy. Kylie will be ecstatic.”
She went back to her office. “Time for your doctor appointment, Bug.”
Kylie made a face. “I don’t want to go.”
At eight, Kylie knew her own mind better than Annie knew hers most days. She was the spitting image of Annie at the same age: corn silk–colored hair and big blue eyes set in a heart-shaped face. But Annie had never been that sure of herself. Her dad’s constant criticism had knocked that out of her.
She steered her daughter out the brick office building to the red Volkswagen crew-cab truck in the parking lot, then set out for town.
The old truck banged and jolted its way across the potholes left by this year’s massive snowfall until Annie reached the paved road into town. She couldn’t imagine living anywhere other than where the Snow King ruled nine months of the year. There was no other place on earth like Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. With the Keweenaw Peninsula to the north and Ottawa National Forest to the south, there could be no more beautiful spot in the world. Her devotion to this place had cost her dearly nine years ago, but every time she saw the cold, crystal-clear waters of the northernmost Great Lakes stretching to the horizon, she managed to convince herself it was worth it.
Part of the town’s special flavor came from the setting. Surrounded by forests on three sides, it had all the natural beauty anyone could want. Old-growth forests, sparkling lakes where fish thronged, and the brilliant blue of that Big Sea Water along the east side.
They drove through town, down Negaunee to Houghton Street to the businesses that comprised Rock Harbor’s downtown. The small, quaint village had been built in the 1850s when copper was king, and its Victorian-style buildings had been carefully preserved by the residents.
Dr. Ben Eckright’s office was a remodeled Victorian boardinghouse on the corner of Houghton and Pepin Streets. She parked in his side lot and let Kylie out of the back.
She glanced across the street to the law office, and her breath caught at the man getting out of the car. It couldn’t be. She stared at the sight of a familiar set of shoulders and closed her eyes a moment. Opening them didn’t reassure her. It really was him.
Jon Dunstan stood beside a shiny red Jaguar. Luckily, he hadn’t seen her yet, and she grabbed Kylie’s hand and ran with her for the side door, praying he wouldn’t look this way. She was still trembling when the door shut behind her.
Excerpt from Edge of Dusk by Colleen Coble. Copyright 2022 by Colleen Coble. Reproduced with permission from Thomas Nelson. All rights reserved.
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Author Bio
Colleen Coble is a USA TODAY bestselling author best known for her coastal romantic suspense novels, including The Inn at Ocean’s Edge, Twilight at Blueberry Barrens, and the Lavender Tides, Sunset Cove, Hope Beach, and Rock Harbor series.
Today I am sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for THE CODEBREAKER’S SECRET by Sara Ackerman on this HTP Books Summer 2022 Historical Fiction Blog Tour.
Below you will find a book summary, my book review, an excerpt from the book, the author’s bio and social media links. Enjoy!
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Book Summary
Dual-timeline historical fiction for fans of Chanel Cleeton and Beatriz Williams, THE CODEBREAKER’S SECRET is a story of codebreaking, secrets, murder, romance and longing.
1943 HONOLULU
Cryptanalysist Isabel Cooper manuevers herself into a job at Station Hypo after the attack on Pearl Harbor, determined to make a difference in the war effort and defeat the Japanese Army by breaking their coded transmissions. When the only other female codebreaker at the station goes missing, Isabel suspects it has something to do with Operation Vengeance, which took out a major enemy target, but she can’t prove it. And with the pilot she thought she was falling for reassigned to a different front, Isabel walks away from it all.
1965 MAUNA KEA BEACH HOTEL
Rookie journalist Lucy Medeiras has her foot in the door for her dream job when she lands the assignment to cover the grand opening of Rockefeller’s new hotel–the most expensive ever built. The week of celebrations is attended by celebrities and politicians, but Lucy gets off on the wrong foot with a cranky experienced reporter from New York named Matteo Russi. When a high-profile guest goes missing, and the ensuing search uncovers a decades-old skeleton in the lava fields, the story gets interesting, and Lucy teams up with Matteo to look into it. Something in Matteo’s memory leads them on a hunt that involves a senatorial candidate, old codes from WWII, and Matteo’s old flame, a woman named Isabel.
THE CODEBREAKER’S SECRET by Sara Ackerman is an engaging historical fiction/mystery story told in the two intertwining timelines of 1943 and 1965 and both beautifully depicted on the lush Hawaiian Islands. This is a standalone story filled with intrigue, murder, and HEA love.
In 1943, Isabel “Izzy” Cooper has finally realized her dream to work as a codebreaker in Hawaii to avenge her brother’s death when Pearl Harbor was attacked. She meets her brother’s best-friend and pilot, Mateo Russi and as the two share their stories of her brother, they begin to get closer, but Russi has secrets of his own.
In 1965, Luana “Lu” Freitas lands her first big assignment covering the grand opening of Louis Roosevelt’s Mauna Kea Beach Hotel. Lu meets the famous Time magazine photographer, Mateo Russi who give her publishing advice as they become friends. When a famous singer goes missing and is believed dead, Lu and Russi begin to uncover secrets which have ties all the way back to Izzy and her codebreaking during WWII.
I enjoyed both timelines in this story and the mystery conclusion which tied them both together. Izzy and Lu are both strong, intelligent female lead characters. Russi is a man who has been shaped by loss and the war and I loved that he ultimately found peace and his HEA. All the characters were fully fleshed and believable. The plot starts a bit slow, but it does pick up and pulls you in so you cannot put the book down. The author does an amazing job of painting word pictures of Hawaii and the culture which makes for another layer to the story. The WWII history and the descriptions of the codebreaking failures and successes were interesting, also.
This is an intriguing historical fiction read with mystery and romance included.
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Excerpt
2
THE CODEBREAKER
Washington, DC, September 1942
There was perhaps no more tedious work in the world. Sitting at a desk all day staring at numbers or letters and looking for patterns. Taking notes and making charts. Thinking until your brain ached. For days and weeks and years on end. The extreme concentration drove some to the bottle, others to madness, and yet others to a quiet greatness that less than ten people in the world might ever know about. You might work for a year on cracking a particular code, only to have nothing to show for it but a tic in your eye and a boil on the back of your thigh. Failure was a given. Accept that and you’d won half the battle.
Isabel sat at her desk staring at a page full of rows and columns of five-letter groups that made no sense whatsoever on this side of the world. But on the other side, in Tokyo where the messages originated, she knew that Japanese officials were discussing war plans. War plans that were on this paper. As her eyes scanned the page, she felt the familiar scratching at the subconscious that meant she was close to seeing some kind of pattern. A prick of excitement traveled up her spine.
Suddenly, a hand waved up and down in front of her face, rudely pulling her out of her thoughts. “Isabel, you gotta put a lid on that noise. No one else can do their jobs,” said Lieutenant Rawlings, her new boss.
She forced a smile. “Sorry, sir, most of the time I’m not aware that I’m doing it. I’m—”
“That may be the case but try harder. I don’t want to lose you.”
Isabel had a tendency to hum during her moments of deepest focus, which had gotten her in trouble with her supervisors over the past year and a half while at Main Navy. In fact, she’d been transferred on more than one occasion due to the distracting nature of it. She’d worked hard to stop it, but when she went into that otherworldly state of mind, where everything slid away and the images moved around in her head of their own accord, the humming kicked back in. It would be like asking her not to breathe.
Lately, the whole team had reached a level of frustration that had turned the air in the room sour. Though they’d had success with the old Red machine, this complex supercipher seemed impossible to break. Faith was draining fast.
With her dress plastered to her back, and sucking on the second salt tablet of the day, Isabel put her head down, scribbling notes on her giant piece of paper. September in Washington burned hotter than a brick oven. Thoughts of her brother, Walt, kept interfering with her ability to stay on task. He would have turned twenty-five years old today. Would have been flying around somewhere in the Pacific about now, shooting down enemy planes, and hooting and hollering when he landed his plane full of bullet holes on the flattop. Walt loved nothing more than the thrill of the chase. Every time she thought of him, a lump formed in her throat and she had to fight back the tears. No one had ever, or ever would, love her more than Walt had.
More than anything, Isabel wanted to get to Hawai‘i and see the spot where his plane plunged into the ocean. To learn more about his final days and hear the story straight from the mouths of his buddies. As if that would somehow make her feel better. She rubbed her eyes. For now, she was stuck here in this hellhole of a building, either sweltering or shivering, depending on what time of year it was.
At 1130, her friend Nora waltzed in from a break, looking as though she’d swallowed the cat. Nora had a way of knowing things before everyone else, and Isabel was lucky enough to be stationed at the desk next to hers.
“Spill the beans, lady,” Isabel said quietly.
Nora glanced around the room, dramatically. “Later.”
Most of the team was still out to lunch, save for a couple of girls across the room, and Rawlings behind the glass in his office.
“No one’s even here, tell me now.”
Nora came over and sat on Isabel’s desk, legs crossed. She picked up a manila folder and began fanning herself, then leaned in. “I’ve heard from a very good source that the brass are tossing around names for the lucky—or unlucky, depending on how you look at it—crypto being sent to Pearl.”
Station Hypo at Pearl Harbor was one of the two main codebreaking units in the Pacific. Nora knew how badly Isabel wanted to be there.
Isabel perked up. “Whose names are being tossed?”
“That, I don’t know.”
“Should I remind Rawlings to remind Feinstein that I’m interested?”
“Absolutely not.”
“It couldn’t hurt, could it?” Isabel said.
“Sorry, love, but those men would just as soon send a polar bear to Hawai‘i as a woman,” Nora said.
“You seem to forget that one of the best codebreakers around is female. And the only reason most of our bosses know anything is because she taught them,” Isabel said, speaking softly. This was the kind of talk that could get you moved to the basement. And Isabel did not do well in basements.
“Neither of us is Agnes Driscoll, so just get it out of your head. And even Agnes is not in Hawai‘i,” Nora whispered.
“There has to be a way.”
“Maybe if you dug up a cache of Japanese codebooks. Or said yes to Captain Smythe,” Nora said with a wink.
Nora and Isabel were a study in opposites. Her short red bob had been curled under and sprayed into place, her lips painted fire-engine red. She had a new man on her arm every weekend and walked around in a cloud of French lilac perfume that permeated their entire floor.
“I have no interest in Captain Smythe,” Isabel said.
Hal Smythe was as dull as they came. At least as far as Isabel was concerned. Intelligent and handsome, but sorely lacking any charisma and the ability to make her laugh—one of her main prerequisites in a man. She had no time to waste on uninteresting men. Or men in general, for that matter. There were codes to be cracked and enemies to be defeated.
“Well, then, you’d better pull off something big,” Nora said.
3
THE CELLAR
Indiana, March 1925
Five-year-old Isabel Cooper had just discovered a fuzzy caterpillar in her backyard, and was bent over inspecting its black-and-yellow pattern when a wall of black blotted the sun from the sky. Always a perceptive child, she looked to the source of the darkness. Clouds had bunched and gathered on the far horizon, the color of gunmetal and cinder and ash. Wind swirled her hair in circles. Isabel ran inside as fast as her scrawny legs would carry her.
“Walter, come look! Something weird is happening to the sky,” she yelled, letting the screen door bang behind her.
Walter had just returned home from school, and was standing in the kitchen with two fistfuls of popcorn and more in his mouth. Mom had gone to the grocery store, and Pa worked late every day at the plant, so it was just the two of them home.
Walter wiped his hands on his worn overalls and followed his sister outside. From a young age, Isabel discovered that Walt, three years older, would do just about anything his younger sister asked. By all accounts he was not your average older brother. He never teased, included her on his ramblings in the woods and never shied to put an arm around her when she needed it. Outside, the wind had picked up considerably, bending the old red oak sideways.
Walt stumbled past her and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, gaping. “Jiminy Christmas!”
Daytime had become night.
“What?” Isabel asked.
“Some kind of bad storm a-brewing. Where’s Lady?” Walt asked, looking around.
Their dog, Lady, had been lounging under the tree when Isabel ran inside, but was now nowhere to be seen. “I don’t know.”
“We better get into the shelter. I don’t like the looks of this.”
“I need Lady.”
The air had been as still as a morning lake, but suddenly a distant boom shook the sky. Moisture collected on their skin, dampening Isabel’s shirt.
“Lady!” they cried.
But Lady didn’t appear.
Walt held up his arm. “See this? My hair is standing up darn near straight. We gotta get under.”
Isabel looked at her arms, which felt tingly and strange. Instead of following her brother to the storm cellar, she ran to the other side of the house.
“Lady!” she yelled again, with a kind of wild desperation that tore at the inside of her throat.
A moment later, Walt scooped her up and tucked her under his arm. “Sorry, but we can’t wait anymore. She’ll have to fend for herself.”
Isabel kicked and punched at the air as they moved toward the cellar. “Put me down!”
Walt ignored her and kept running. His skin was sticky, his breath ragged. They had only used the cellar a couple times for storms, but on occasion Isabel helped her mother change out food supplies. The place gave her the creeps.
“What about Mom? We have to wait for her,” she said.
“Mom will know where to find us.”
In the distance, an eerie whistle rose from the earth. Seconds later, the wind picked up again, this time blowing the tree in the other direction. From the clouds, an ink black thing stuck out below. Walt yanked open the door, threw Isabel inside and fumbled around in the dark for a moment before finding the light. Roots crawled through cracks in the brick walls. They went down the steep stairs, Isabel’s face wet with tears and snot.
“Come, sit with me,” Walt said, pulling her against him on the old bench Pa had built.
Warmth flowed out of him like honey, and she instantly felt better. But then she thought about Lady and her mother, who were out there somewhere. Her whole body started shaking. Soon, a rumble sent vibrations through the wall and into Isabel’s teeth. Too scared to cry, she dug her fingers into Walt’s arm and hung on for dear life. Suddenly, a frantic scratching came from above.
Isabel jumped up, but Walt stopped her. “You stay down here.”
Walt climbed to the top and opened the door. The wind took it and slammed it down hard. A loud barking ensued, and Walt fought with the door again, finally managing to get it open and bring Lady inside. The air possessed a ferocity Isabel had never seen before.
Lady immediately ran down the steps and started licking Isabel’s arms and legs, and spinning in circles at her feet. Isabel hugged the big dog with all her might, burying her face in Lady’s long golden fur. When Walt came back down, the three of them huddled together as a roar louder than a barreling freight train filled their ears. Soon, Lady began panting.
Walt squeezed Isabel’s hand. “It’s okay, we’re safe down here.”
He had to yell to be heard. And then the light went out. Darkness filled every crack and crevice. The earth groaned. The door above rattled so fiercely that she was sure it would fly off at any moment. All Isabel could think about was her mother out there somewhere in this tempest. Soon, her lungs were having a hard time taking air in.
“I can’t breathe,” she finally said.
“It’s just nerves. They act up in times like these.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I had it happen before.”
She took his word for it, because it was hard to talk above the noise of the storm, and because Walt always knew what he was talking about. Then, directly overhead, they heard a sky-splitting crack and a thundering boom. The cellar door sounded ready to cave. Isabel and Walt and Lady moved to the crawl space under the steps. The three of them barely fit, even with Lady in her lap. Lady kissed the tears from Isabel’s face.
Finally, the noise began to recede. When there was no longer any storm sounds, Walt went up the steps with Isabel close behind. He pushed but nothing happened. Pushed again. Still nothing.
“Something must have fallen on it,” he said.
“I have to pee.”
“You’re going to have to wait.”
“I can’t wait.”
Walt banged away on the door with no luck. “Then I guess you have to go in your pants. Sorry, sis.”
Isabel began to grow sure that this was where they would live out the rest of their short lives. That no one had survived the apocalypse outside and they would be left to rot with the earthworms, roots growing through their bodies until they’d been reduced to dirt. Her whole body trembled as Walt spoke consoling words and rubbed her back.
“They’ll find us soon, don’t you fret.”
Lady licked her hand, but Isabel was beyond words, shivering and gulping for air. Every now and then Walt went up to try to push the doors again, but each time, nothing happened. She vowed to herself that she would never, ever be trapped underground again. She’d take her chances with a twister over being entombed any day.
It was more than an hour before someone came to get them. An hour of dark thoughts and silence. In the distance they heard voices, and eventually a pounding on the cellar door. “Are you three in there? It’s Pa,” said a voice.
“Pa!” they both cried.
“We got a big tree down on the door up here. Hang tight, I’ll get you out soon.”
When the doors finally opened, a blinding light shone in. Pa reached his hand in and pulled them out, wrapping them in the biggest hug they’d ever had. Never mind that the old truck was upside down and one side of the house missing.
“Where’s your mother?” Pa said.
“She went to the store,” Walt said.
Pa’s face dropped clear to the ground. “Which store did she say she was goin’ to?”
“She didn’t say, but she left just as soon as I got home from school,” Walt said.
Only half listening, Isabel spun around in disbelief at the chaos of branches and splintered wood and car parts and things that didn’t belong in the yard. Sink. Baby carriage. Bookshelf. It appeared as though the edge of the tornado had gone right over their place, leaving half the house intact, and obliterating the rest.
“Son, stay here with your sister. And stay out of the house until I get back. It might be unstable,” Pa said, running off to his car.
“Mom will be okay, won’t she? The store is safe, isn’t it?” Isabel asked.
“Sure she will. Pa will be back with her soon,” Walt said.
They wandered around the yard, dazed. This far out on the country road, the nearest neighbor, old Mr. Owens, was a mile away. Drained, Isabel sat down and pulled Lady in for a hug. Pa didn’t return for a long time, and when he did, they could tell right away that something was wrong. His eyes were rimmed in red, like he had been crying. And Pa never cried.
“Kids, your mom isn’t coming back.”
That was the first time Isabel Cooper lost the most important person in her life.
Sara Ackerman is a USA TODAY bestselling author who writes books about love and life, and all of their messy and beautiful imperfections. She believes that the light is just as important as the dark, and that the world is in need of uplifting stories. Born and raised in Hawaii, she studied journalism and later earned graduate degrees in psychology and Chinese medicine. She blames Hawaii for her addiction to writing, and sees no end to its untapped stories
Today I am sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for POINT LAST SEEN (Last Seen in Gothic Book #1) by Christina Dodd on this HQN books blog tour.
Below you will find a book summary, my book review, an excerpt from the book and the author’s bio and social media links. Enjoy!
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Book Summary
From New York Times bestselling author Christina Dodd comes a brand new suspense about a reclusive artist who retrieves a seemingly dead woman from the Pacific Ocean…only to have her come back to life with no memory of what happened to her. With a strong female protagonist, a chilling villain, and twisty secrets that will keep you turning the pages.
LIFE LAST SEEN
When you’ve already died, there should be nothing left to fear… When Adam Ramsdell pulls Elle’s half-frozen body from the surf on a lonely California beach, she has no memory of what her full name is and how she got those bruises ringing her throat.
GIRL LAST SEEN
Elle finds refuge in Adam’s home on the edge of Gothic, a remote village located between the steep lonely mountains and the raging Pacific Ocean. As flashes of her memory return, Elle faces a terrible truth—buried in her mind lurks a secret so dark it could get her killed.
POINT LAST SEEN
Everyone in Gothic seems to hide a dark past. Even Adam knows more than he will admit. Until Elle can unravel the truth, she doesn’t know who to trust, when to run and who else might be hurt when the killer who stalks her nightmares appears to finish what he started…
POINT LAST SEEN (Last Seen in Gothic Book #1) by Christina Dodd is the first action-packed romantic suspense in this new series written with plenty of thrills and quirky inhabitants in the small Pacific coastal town of Gothic.
Adam Ramsdell has found the privacy he seeks in Gothic, CA as he works to turn salvaged metal into works of art and works as an armorer. When the local fortune teller tells Adam he must go the beach, he goes for the peace the ocean brings him but discovers a half-frozen body being tossed out onto the beach. He believes she is dead until he throws her over his shoulder to carry to his ATV and she revives as she brings up the sea water trapped in her lungs.
Elle has no memory of how she ended up on the beach, but she knows she has been strangled, beaten and is deathly afraid of a large dark shadow. As flashes of memory slowly return, she begins to endear herself to the people of Gothic and discover Adam’s secrets. She cannot remember much, but she knows she can trust Adam to protect her.
As Elle works to recover her memory, she doesn’t realize that those out to end her life are near and Adam has his own demons from his past that may well be out for revenge also. Will they be able to survive their pasts for a future together?
There are several plot threads throughout this romantic suspense that all come together to make a wonderful read. Adam is the tortured hero with the difficult past and his transformation from loner to lover was well paced and believable because the town already looked up to him even though he did not acknowledge it. Elle is a strong and determined heroine even without her memory, she asked for the help she needed it, but also stood up for herself. The town’s cast of characters were quirky and added some humor to the story as well as hiding secrets that I hope will be divulged in future books in this series. After the HEA, I assume each new book will have a new H/h and the town’s cast of characters and the location itself is what will be continued in this series. I will be looking forward to more.
This is a romantic suspense that will keep you reading until the very end.
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Excerpt
two
A Morning in February
Gothic, California
The storm off the Pacific had been brutal, a relentless night of cold rain and shrieking wind. Adam Ramsdell had spent the hours working, welding and polishing a tall, heavy, massive piece of sculpture, not hearing the wailing voices that lamented their own passing, not shuddering when he caught sight of his own face in the polished stainless steel. He sweated as he moved swiftly to capture the image he saw in his mind, a clawed monster rising from the deep: beautiful, deadly, dangerous.
And as always, when dawn broke, the storm moved on and he stepped away, he realized he had failed.
Impatient, he shoved the trolley that held the sculpture toward the wall. One of claws swiped his bare chest and proved to him he’d done one thing right: razor-sharp, it opened a long, thin gash in his skin. Blood oozed to the surface. He used his toe to lock the wheels on the trolley, securing the sculpture in case of the occasional California earth tremor.
Then with the swift efficiency of someone who had dealt with minor wounds, his own and others’, he found a clean towel and stanched the flow. Going into the tiny bathroom, he washed the site and used superglue to close the gash. The cut wasn’t deep; it would hold.
He tied on his running shoes and stepped outside into the short, bent, wet grass that covered his acreage. The rosemary hedge that grew at the edge of his front porch released its woody scent. The newly washed sunlight had burned away the fog, and Adam started running uphill toward town, determined to get breakfast, then come home to bed. Now that the sculpture was done and the storm had passed, he needed the bliss of oblivion, the moments of peace sleep could give him.
Yet every year as the Ides of March and the anniversary of his failure approached, nightmares tracked through his sleep and followed him into the light. They were never the same but always a variation on a theme: he had failed, and in two separate incidents, people had died…
The route was all uphill; nevertheless, each step was swift and precise. The sodden grasses bent beneath his running shoes. He never slipped; a man could die from a single slip. He’d always known that, but now, five years later, he knew it in ways he could never forget.
As he ran, he shed the weariness of a long night of cutting, grinding, hammering, polishing. He reached the asphalt and he lengthened his stride, increased his pace.
He ran past the cemetery where a woman knelt to take a chalk etching of a crumbling headstone, past the Gothic Museum run by local historian Freya Goodnight.
The Gothic General Store stood on the outside of the lowest curve of the road. Today the parking lot was empty, the rockers were unoccupied, and the store’s sixteen-year-old clerk lounged in the open door. “How you doing, Mr. Ramsdell?” she called.
He lifted his hand. “Hi, Tamalyn.”
She giggled.
Somehow, on the basis of him waving and remembering her name, she had fallen in love with him. He reminded himself that the dearth of male teens in the area left him little competition, but he could feel her watching him as he ran past the tiny hair salon where Daphne was cutting a local rancher’s hair in the outdoor barber chair.
His body urged him to slow to a walk, but he deliberately pushed himself.
Every time he took a turn, he looked up at Widow’s Peak, the rocky ridge that overshadowed the town, and the Tower, the edifice built by the Swedish silent-film star who in the early 1930s had bought land and created the town to her specifications.
At last he saw his destination, the Live Oak, a four-star restaurant in a one-star town. The three-story building stood at the corner of the highest hairpin turn and housed the eatery and three exclusive suites available for rent.
When Adam arrived he was gasping, sweating, holding his side. Since his return from the Amazon basin, he had never completely recovered his stamina.
Irksome.
At the corner of the building, he turned to look out at the view.
The vista was magnificent: spring-green slopes, wave-battered sea stacks, the ocean’s endless surges, and the horizon that stretched to eternity. During the Gothic jeep tour, Freya always told the tourists that from this point, if a person tripped and fell, that person could tumble all the way to the beach. Which was an exaggeration. Mostly.
Adam used the small towel hooked into his waistband to wipe the sweat off his face. Then disquiet began its slow crawl up his spine.
Someone had him under observation.
He glanced up the grassy hill toward the olive grove and stared. A glint, like someone stood in the trees’ shadows watching with binoculars. Watching him.
No. Not him. A peregrine falcon glided through the shredded clouds, and seagulls cawed and circled. Birders came from all over the word to view the richness of the Big Sur aviary life. As he watched, the glint disappeared. Perhaps the birder had spotted a tufted puffin. Adam felt an uncomfortable amount of relief in that: it showed a level of paranoia to imagine someone was watching him, but…
But. He had learned never to ignore his instincts. The hard way, of course.
He stepped into the restaurant doorway, and from across the restaurant he heard the loud snap of the continental waiter’s fingers and saw the properly suited Ludwig point at a small, isolated table in the back corner. Adam’s usual table.
Before Adam took a second step, he made an inventory of all possible entrances and exits, counted the number of occupants and assessed them as possible threats, and evaluated any available weapons. An old habit, it gave him peace of mind.
Three exits: front door, door to kitchen, door to the upper suites.
Mr. Kulshan sat by the windows, as was his wont. He liked the sun, and he lived to people-watch. Why not? He was in his midnineties. What else had he to do?
In the conference room, behind an open door, reserved for a business breakfast, was a long table with places set for twenty people.
A young couple, tourists by the look of them, held hands on the table and smiled into each other’s eyes.
Nice. Really nice to know young love still existed.
There, her back against the opposite wall, was an actress. Obviously an actress. She had possibly arrived for breakfast, or to stay in one of the suites. Celebrities visits happened often enough that most of the town was blasé, although the occasional scuffle with the paparazzi did lend interest to the village’s tranquil days.
She wasn’t pretty. Her face was too angular, her mouth too wide, her chin too determined. She was reading through a stack of papers and using a marker to highlight and a ballpoint to make notes… And she wore glasses. Not casual I need a little visual assistance glasses. These were Coke-bottle bottoms set in lime-green frames.
Interesting: Why had an actress not had laser surgery? Not that it mattered. Behind those glasses her brown eyes sparked with life, interest and humor, although he didn’t understand how someone could convey all that while never looking up. She had shampoo-commercial hair—long, dark, wavy, shining—and when she caught it in her hand and shoved it over one shoulder, he felt his breath catch.
A gravelly voice interrupted a moment that had gone on too long and revealed too clearly how Adam’s isolation had affected him. “Hey, you. Boy! Come here.” Mr. Kulshan beckoned. Mr. Kulshan, who had once been tall, sturdy and handsome. Then the jaws of old age had seized him, gnawed him down to a bent-shouldered, skinny old man.
Adam lifted a finger to Ludwig, indicating breakfast would have to wait.
Ludwig glowered. Maybe his name was suggestive, but the man looked like Ludwig van Beethoven: rough, wild, wavy hair, dark brooding eyes under bushy eyebrows, pouty lips, cleft in the chin. He seldom talked and never smiled. Most people were afraid of him.
Adam was not. He walked to Mr. Kulshan’s table and took a seat opposite the old man. “What can I do for you, sir?”
“Don’t call me sir. I told you, call me K.H.”
Adam didn’t call people by their first names. That encouraged friendliness.
“If you can’t do that, call me Kulshan.” With his fork, the old guy stabbed a lump of breaded something and handed it to Adam. “What do you think this is?”
Adam had traveled the world, learned to eat what was offered, so he took the fork, sniffed the lump and nibbled a corner. “I believe it’s fried sweetbread.”
Mr. Kulshan made a gagging noise. “My grandmother made us eat sweetbread.” He bit it off the end of the fork. “This isn’t as awful as hers.” With loathing, he said, “This is Frenchie food.”
“Señor Alfonso is Spanish.”
Mr. Kulshan ignored Adam for all he was worth. “Next thing you know, this Alfonso will be scraping snails off the sidewalk and calling it escargots.”
“Actually…” Adam caught the twinkle in Mr. Kulshan’s eyes and stood. “Fine. Pull my chain. I’m going to have breakfast.”
Mr. Kulshan caught his wrist. “Have you heard what Caltrans is doing about the washout?” He referred to the California Department of Transportation and their attempts to repair the Pacific Coast Highway and open it to traffic.
“No. What?”
“Nothing!” Mr. Kulshan cackled wildly, then nodded at the actress. “The girl. Isn’t she something? Built like a brick shithouse.”
Interested, Adam settled back into the chair. “Who is she?”
“Don’t you ever read People magazine? That’s Clarice Burbage. She’s set to star in the modern adaptation of Shakespeare’s…um…one of Shakespeare’s plays. Who cares? She’ll play a king. Or something. That’s the script she’s reading.”
Clarice looked up as if she’d heard them—which she had, because Mr. Kulshan wore hearing aids that didn’t work well enough to compensate for his hearing loss—and smiled and nodded genially.
Mr. Kulshan grinned at her. “Hi, Clarice. Loved you in Inferno!”
“Thank you, K.H.” She projected her voice so he could hear her.
Mr. Kulshan shot Adam a triumphant look that clearly said See? Clarice Burbage calls me by my first name.
The actress-distraction was why the two men were surprised when the door opened and a middle-aged, handsome, casually dressed woman with cropped red hair walked in.
New York Times bestselling author Christina Dodd writes “edge-of-the-seat suspense” (Iris Johansen) with “brilliantly etched characters, polished writing, and unexpected flashes of sharp humor that are pure Dodd” (ALA Booklist). Her fifty-eight books have been called “scary, sexy, and smartly written” by Booklist and, much to her mother’s delight, Dodd was once a clue in the Los Angeles Times crossword puzzle. Enter Christina’s worlds and join her mailing list at www.christinadodd.com.
