Tag: #suspense

Book Review: Storm Rising by Sara Driscoll

RATING: 5 out of 5 Stars

STORM RISING (FBI K-9 Book #3) by Sara Driscoll is another exciting addition to the FBI K-9 series. This book has Meg Jennings and her search and rescue Labrador retriever, Hawk once again embroiled in a fast-paced plot that starts as a search and rescue after a hurricane and turns into a crime thriller involving human trafficking and the underage sex-slave trade.

In the wake of Hurricane Cole, all hands are on deck for rescues around Virginia Beach. Meg, Hawk and all of her FBI team members are sent to help search for survivors. Lt. Todd Webb is sent to assist as a paramedic/firefighter so they ride down together. As they are out together, Webb spots an overturned van in a creek bed. They rush to check it out and find two young girls tied to their seats dead. Meg and Hawk take over and search for anyone who might have escaped the van.

Hawk finds Emma, a runaway entrapped in a sex-slave ring. The case is turned over to Special Agent Walter Van Cleave, but due to Emma’s connection to Meg and Hawk, he asks for their help. Van and Meg join forces and soon realize that this case is much more complicated than a small-time syndicate. This case will take Van and Meg into the lives of powerful, influential people who all believe they are above the law.

Once again, this author had me completely engrossed in her plot and characters. Meg and Hawk make an amazing team. It is interesting to learn about the training and abilities of all the dogs on this FBI team. Meg, Cara, Webb and McCord are becoming quite the human team. Meg’s family and friends all have roles to play after the hurricane and I love to see how they have become more fleshed out as the series has continued. I hope to see more of Emma in future stories, also.

This book can be read as a standalone, but the relationships of all the main characters continues to grow and you become more attached with each book so I recommend reading them in order.

Thank you very much to Kensington Books, Sara Driscoll and Net Galley for allowing me to read this eARC.

Book Review: Shelter In Place by Nora Roberts

RATING: 5 out of 5 Stars

SHELTER IN PLACE by Nora Roberts had my emotions all over the place, but isn’t that what a good book does? Part psychological thriller, part romantic suspense and part coming of age for a group who survive one of the horrors of present day life, a mass shooter event.

This book starts with a mass shooting perpetrated by three teenage males at a suburban mall.

Simone Knox and her two best friends are in the movie theater. When Simone starts to leave the restroom, she hears screams and gunshots. She returns to a restroom stall and is the first to call 911 as she shelters in place.

Reed Quartermaine waits tables in an Italian restaurant in the DownEast Mall. On his way back from his break, he is confronted by people running the opposite way and pops of gun fire. He picks up a bloodied little boy who appears to be alone and runs for cover.

Essie McVee is a police officer with her partner, dealing with a minor traffic accident in the mall parking lot when they receive the call of active shooters. She is the first on the scene at the movie theater and is able to take down one of the shooters.

From this point on, the story follows the intertwining lives of these three main survivors and how all of the survivors dealt with the trauma of that day and death of their family or friends throughout their lives. What becomes apparent though as time goes on is there is one person who is not finished with that day and is seeking revenge against all of those who survived.

I loved all of these characters! Reed and Simone had such differing ways of coping with their lives after the shooting. Reed is such a strong hero who refuses to let evil win. Essie is the mentor Reed needs at just the right time. Simone runs from the memories at first, but through her art she begins to heal and then begins to memorialize the loved ones lost on that day in the mall. Even all of the secondary characters bring such life to this book. I absolutely loved CiCi, who was the best grandmother character ever.

This book is written covering many years. Ms. Roberts has the characters growing stronger and coming together to fight the evil that has tracked them for execution. I found this book difficult to put down. I love Nora Roberts’ books and characters.

Book Review: Red War by Kyle Mills

RATING: 5 out of 5 Stars

RED WAR (Mitch Rapp #17) is the newest espionage thriller in the Mitch Rapp series started by author Vince Flynn and now carried forward by author Kyle Mills. This is Mr. Mills’ fourth installment in the series. Red War is another edge-of-you-seat thrill ride with a plausible world crisis and all of the geopolitical intrigue, blood, bombs and action I have come to expect in a Mitch Rapp book.

Maxim Krupin, the Russian president, has been diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor. It must be kept a secret as he receives treatment. He plans to eliminate any of his countrymen who could grab power from him if his condition is known and he plans a distraction with worldwide consequences to cover his absence. Two of the men he trusts to keep him in power are Andrei Sokolov a disgraced war criminal, who he places in charge of Russian armed forces and his young personal assassin, Nikita Pushkin, who he sends to eliminate his predecessor, Grisha Azarov.

No one in the U.S. government knows what to make of the new dangerous unpredictability of Krupin. CIA Director Irene Kennedy learns of Krupin’s illness and now understands the world is facing a man who has nothing to lose and psychopathic general, who believes Russia should rule the world.  Mitch and Grisha team up with Scott Coleman and his team to find Krupin and eliminate the threat of World War III and a nuclear holocaust.

I was so excited to be chosen as a Mitch Rapp Ambassador and receive the ARC of Red War from the publisher in advance of publication. I did not want it to end! Kyle Mills has done a great job of continuing the Mitch Rapp character and series. The action, world travel, political intrigue and plot twists just keep coming. I was also very happy to see the return of one of my series favorites in this book. This is a MUST READ thriller series for me. Each adventure can be read as a standalone, but the personal and professional relationships carry forward and add to the interesting backstory that makes the series narrative layered and keeps me coming back for more than just the individual current threat.

This is one of my favorite thriller series and I highly recommend it!

Book Review: Devoted to Pleasure by Shayla Black

RATING: 4 out of 5 Stars

DEVOTED TO PLEASURE (Devoted Lovers Book #1) by Shayla Black is a sexy contemporary romance with the added subplot of the hero being the bodyguard for the heroine. This is a page-turning start of a new series with as many twists and turns in the romance as in the suspense.

Shealyn West is the sexy, beautiful and down to earth co-star of a steamy nighttime TV drama. Her fame came quickly and it is not everything she wished for. To help her friend and co-star, Shealyn fakes a relationship with him. In a moment of emotional weakness, she makes a mistake which could be career ending and is now being used to blackmail her. She hires a bodyguard to protect her for the money drop and finds a real attraction that is too powerful to avoid.

Cutter Bryant is ex-military and believes in duty above all else. He loves his high-octane job in private security, but he is a small town boy at heart. Cutter’s childhood friend is in trouble and Cutter wants to solve her problems for her out of obligation, but it means sacrificing his own chance for love. When he is sent to Hollywood to work for Shealyn, he cannot believe the chemistry between them. He has never crossed the line between work and personal before, but there is something between them that is worth trying to find a way to be together.

As Shealyn and Cutter work together to discover who is blackmailing Shealyn, their attraction becomes as explosive as the secrets they need to expose. Will Cutter be able to protect Shealyn from the mounting danger? Can Shealyn believe in and trust a real HEA is possible?

I feel this is a very solid start to this new series. Cutter and Shealyn complimented each other very well. I found the background information on both the H/h’s troubled childhoods which impacted how they behaved in the present compelling. I did have a problem with how often Cutter’s situation back home came up. I found the friend in trouble an immature whiner, not sympathetic and Cutter too self-sacrificing even though it worked out in the end. The blackmail and physical danger had enough twists to keep me anxiously turning the pages and the sex was explicit and smoking hot. I will be looking forward to more books in this series!

Thanks very much to Berkley Publishing Group and Net Galley for allowing me to read this eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Book Review: Murder Girl by Lisa Renee Jones

RATING: 5 out of 5 Stars

MURDER GIRL (Lilah Love #2) by Lisa Renee Jones is the second book in this thriller/suspense FBI profiler series and picks up right where the first book’s overall plotline left us hanging for more. You can pick up this book which has a great synopsis of book #1 in the beginning, but the first book was just as well written, so I really do recommend you take the time to read it, too.

Lilah Love is one of the best profilers in the FBI. She can get into the mind of the killers’ she profiles without emotional involvement hampering her job and so the nickname “Murder Girl”. Her present case has her returning home to the Hamptons and her ex, Kane Mendez is waiting for her. Lilah believes in law and order, but is drawn to the dark, while Kane is the bad boy, millionaire business man who could be all bad, but he continually tries to fight the dark for Lilah.

Lilah is piecing together the clues of a series of murders others believe are not connected, but she believes are done by an assassin and are all tied together. Each time she gets another piece of the puzzle, she is taken down another path that may go back years and could connect to a secret in her past and her family.

Lilah has to find the assassin, deal with her continually conflicted relationship with Kane and hopefully keep everyone she cares about alive.

Lilah is a great main character. Foul mouthed, beautiful and seriously devoted to catching killers. Her romantic interest in Kane can go so many ways and I am looking forward to seeing if the author can work out their differences enough to bring them together or if he remains more of a character who helps Lilah and just has benefits. Lilah’s FBI supervisor and the assassin, Ghost, are both going to make future books very interesting, also.

I definitely recommend this book and series. It is well written and a page turner that just keeps throwing new twists and revelations at the reader. Bring on book #3, please!

Thank you very much to Montlake Romance and Net Galley for allowing me to read this eARC in exchange for and honest review.

Book Review: Connecting Strangers by Rachel Carrington

RATING: 3 our of 5 Stars

CONNECTING STRANGERS (Discovering Emily #1) by Rachel Carrington is a Contemporary romance with an element of suspense. It is also the first in a series with a small cliffhanger to entice you to continue on in the series.

Emily Jacobs is on the run from an abusive boyfriend with powerful connections. She leaves with nothing and is lucky enough to find a woman who understands her, her situation and wants to help. She also seems to have attracted the eye of the handsome sheriff, Adam Madison. There is an instant attraction. Emily has secrets, but so does the sheriff. Can the two come together and overcome an ex on the hunt for revenge?

The story has some interesting characters, both good and bad. The small town feeling of acceptance and warmth where Emily ends up was a great contrast to where she came from. I hope there are people like Francine out there in the world.

Ms. Carrington’s writing style was very readable, but there were too many tropes and unbelievable situations for me to really get into this story. Emily was a character that I wanted to empathize with and cheer on to a HEA, but an instant attraction put me off. Personally, I would have preferred a guardian relationship and then a growth into attraction over the story arc. I also had a problem with how often she fought the help she was offered. Even if she was afraid of her ex finding her and felt she was putting others in danger, she had nothing.

For me this was just an O.K. read for which I had to suspend realistic belief one too many times. The author’s characters and writing style are what kept me reading, but I will not be continuing on in this series.

Written for and posted first on The Romance Reviews.