Stacking the Shelves (91)

Stacking the Shelves

This week, I received a LOT of books for contests that I’m judging, and not much else. Except the second book in Robin York’s awesome Caroline & West series, which I’ve been stalking NetGalley for. I can’t wait!

For Review:
Country Roads (Whisper Horse #2) by Nancy Herkness
Harder (Caroline & West #2) by Robin York
A Heat of the Moment Thing by Maggie Le Page
Island Healing (St. Anne’s Island #1) by Virginia McCullough
Leave the Lights On by Karen Stivali
Southern Fried Blues (The Officers’ Ex-Wives Club #1) by Jamie Farrell
The Spiritglass Charade (Stoker & Holmes #2) by Colleen Gleason
That Summer by Lauren Willig
Training Travis by Cathleen Tully

Purchased:
Dragon Age: The Masked Empire (Dragon Age #4) by Patrick Weekes

Review: Unlocked by John Scalzi

unlocked by John ScalziFormat read: ebook purchased from Amazon
Formats available: ebook, hardcover
Genre: science fiction
Length: 63 pages
Publisher: Tor Books
Date Released: May 7, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

A new near-future science fiction novella by John Scalzi, one of the most popular authors in modern SF. Unlocked traces the medical history behind a virus that will sweep the globe and affect the majority of the world’s population, setting the stage for Lock In, the next major novel by John Scalzi.

My Review:

Even for a novella, the publisher’s blurb for Unlocked is not just short, but also not terribly descriptive. And it doesn’t come close to doing this marvelous introduction to Lock In any kind of justice.

Unlocked carries a more descriptive subtitle: An Oral History of Haden’s Syndrome. That’s almost descriptive enough.

Unlocked isn’t precisely a narrative, it’s more like a collection of narratives around a single event. By presenting the story as snippets from oral interviews, it gives the reader the kind of “you are there” perspective that doesn’t usually happen in fiction. It brings the reader to the center of the story, as though we were watching it as it happened, or as if it were part of our shared consciousness.

Which it is for the people involved.

The individuals don’t stand out, but what emerges is the history of how the world dealt, or would deal, with a global pandemic in the age of mass transportation and mass media, where the survivors and their families could become, not just “poster children”, but symbols for all those who suffered and are suffering.

Even after some of them have discovered that Hadens may be the best thing that ever happened to them.

There are historic parallels for this kind of disease, the 1918 Flu Pandemic and the Black Death are examples.There have been instances where the loss was so pervasive that it touched every family, the U.S. Civil War being a prime example there. But with Haden’s Syndrome, the author has created a leveling disease that cuts across all boundaries, and everyone sees the effects on the daily news.

Escape Rating A-: This is hard to rate. While I was reading, I myself was “locked in” to the narrative. It rang true as the way that things might happen, given the circumstances. It also brought me back to the questions about “the needs of the many”, and how society would handle it when the relatively small percentage affected adds up to huge absolute numbers. What would we do?

The mistakes made, and the successes discovered, followed a kind of logical progression that kept me going from one personal account to another, watching the picture unfold.

lock in by john scalziUnlocked does an absolutely terrific job of setting up the background for Lock In (which yes, I have an ARC of and could not resist after Unlocked).

Unlocked presents an all-too-real possibility and stretches it into a future that is scarily easy to envision. If you are waiting with bated breath for Lock In, read Unlocked first. It makes reading Lock In a much richer experience.

And it’s GOOD!

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: Silver Skin by D L McDermott

silver skin by d l mcdermottFormat read: ebook provided by NetGalley
Formats available: ebook
Genre: paranormal romance
Series: Cold Iron #2
Length: 369 pages
Publisher: Pocket Star
Date Released: April 14, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, KoboAll Romance

Helene Whitney has been losing time. Not losing track of time, but missing hours, finding whole blank spaces in her day she can’t account for. A year ago she would have put it down to overwork and exhaustion, but that was before she found out about the Good Neighbors, the Fair Folk, the Beautiful People, the Fae.

Ancient, immortal, tricksy and cruel, these creatures out of myth and legend rule the Irish enclaves of South Boston and Charlestown, and one of them has been using magic to abduct and control Helene for hours every day, gaining access to the collection at her museum and searching for ancient objects of Fae power.

Now, Helene’s only hope of escaping this unknown assailant lies with the Fae sorcerer, Miach MacCecht, a man she knows she can never trust—and who may prove impossible to resist.

My Review:

Cold Iron by D.L. McDermottThis was the story I wanted at the end of Cold Iron (reviewed at The Book Pushers), and I read it in one sitting.

Silver Skin felt like a totally different story from Cold Iron, because the hero and the heroine felt like much stronger people. Helene and Miach are both, in their various ways, survivors.

Helene is Beth’s friend from Cold Iron. She’s the development director (read chief fund raiser) for the museum where Beth works. Her introduction to the reality of the Fae in the 21st century was brutal and almost fatal. But she walked away, in spite of her attraction to the sorceror Miach.

Some things come at just too high a price.

But she can’t stay away. Not because of Miach, but because some other, and unknown fae is stealing hours out of her life. She recognizes enough to know that she is being compelled, but can’t remember who is doing the compelling or what she is being compelled to do in her lost hours.

The only person she feels safe in telling her problem to is Beth, but Beth is out of the country on a dig. When Helene tries to tell her over the phone, the compulsion prevents her speaking the words. She only knows one other person who might be able to help her, but she doesn’t want to put herself back in his world. She has no choice, and she has to know if he’s the cause. He was before.

Miach runs the protection rackets in the Irish neighborhoods of South Boston, and he has for centuries. He’s the most powerful fae to remain on this side of the wall between the sidhe and our world. While the fae are generally selfish and self-centered, Miach has his own reasons for wanting to keep the fae court and the wild hunt out of our world. His family, his mixed blood children, grand-children and great-grandchildren, will be the first playthings of the court. He protects his own.

He wanted Helene to be his from the moment he first met her, but when his sons conspired to turn her over to the Prince Consort, he lost his chance. Until some other fae placed multiple geasa on her; making her forget, making her search her museum, making her someone else’s pawn.

In order to break the compulsions, even Miach needs help. And information. Someone is helping the Prince Consort to try breaking the barrier between worlds. Digging into that plot could get them all killed.

If the curse that has been placed upon Helene doesn’t destroy her first.

Escape Rating A-: Even while kidnapped and tortured, Helene never lets herself be a victim. No matter how bad things get (and they get very bad) Helene goes into every situation with her eyes wide open, and always searching for a way out. She’s attracted to Miach, but is unwilling to be compelled into a relationship. And the more she fights, the more he values her. While there is an element of the thrill of the chase to their relationship, it also feels like Miach wants a real relationship with a whole person; he’s cared for all the women in his life over the past 2 millennia, and wants a partner and not a slave.

Helene is in grave danger for the entire story, and wants to grab life with both hands. She decides that Miach is part of what she wants, and it is her decision and not a compulsion.

In addition to just how hot the relationship between Miach and Helene gets to be, we also see more of the fae who have survived and adapted to our world, and the breadth and depth of the plot to return the court. The twists and turns in the plot were convoluted, but made complete sense once you saw them. This part of the story is going to spill over multiple books, as it should. We only saw the beginning of how far the Prince Consort is willing to go to return the courts to the world, and he’s both intelligent and very, very sick.

stone song by dl mcdermottI had such fun with Silver Skin that I started Stone Song the minute I finished. The war between the adapted fae in our world and the high court is heating up nicely!

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: A Case of Spontaneous Combustion by Stephanie Osborn

case of spontaneous combustion by stephanie osbornFormat read: ebook provided by the author
Formats available: ebook
Genre: mystery
Series: The Displaced Detective #5
Length: 344 pages
Publisher: Twilight Times
Date Released: May 10, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Amazon, Barnes & Noble

When an entire village on the Salisbury Plain is wiped out in an apparent case of mass spontaneous combustion, Her Majesty’s Secret Service contacts The Holmes Agency to investigate. Unfortunately Sherlock Holmes and his wife, Dr. Skye Chadwick-Holmes, have just had their first serious fight, over her abilities and attitudes as an investigator. To make matters worse, he is summoned to England in the middle of the night, and she is not — and due to the invocation of the National Security Act in the summons, he cannot even wake her and tell her.

Once in London, Holmes looks into the horror that is now Stonegrange. His investigations take him into a dangerous undercover assignment in search of a possible terror ring, though he cannot determine how a human agency could have caused the disaster. There, he works hard to pass as a recent immigrant and manual laborer from a certain rogue Mideastern nation as he attempts to uncover signs of the terrorists.

Meanwhile, alone in Colorado, Skye battles raging wildfires and tames a wild mustang stallion, all while believing her husband has abandoned her.

Who — or what — caused the horror in Stonegrange? Will Holmes find his way safely through the metaphorical minefield that is modern Middle Eastern politics? Will Skye subdue Smoky before she is seriously hurt? Will this predicament seriously damage — even destroy — the couple’s relationship? And can Holmes stop the terrorists before they unleash their outré weapon again?

My Review:

Mass human spontaneous combustion–it sounds like something that would be reported in the tabloids at the grocery checkout stands. And that is what happens in A Case of Spontaneous Combustion. But unlike the usual tabloid stories, this one is true, and MI-5 calls in Sherlock Holmes to investigate.

The Case of the Displaced Detective - The Arrival by Stephanie OsbornIf it sounds like I’ve sailed even further into tabloid-land, I haven’t. This story is the fifth book in Stephanie Osborn’s Displaced Detective series, where Sherlock Holmes has been brought to our world through quantum physics. (Read The Case of the Displaced Detective: the Arrival (reviewed here) for details.)

The difference is that the Sherlock Holmes in this particular pastiche is a real person, not a fictional construct as he was in our version of the multiverse. And being human and not literary, he does not completely resemble the literary version in Conan Doyle’s stories. Because this one managed to fall in love, and get married. Eventually, and with a lot of persuasion and adaptation from the 19th century to the 21st. (See The Case of the Displaced Detective: At Speed (review) and The Case of the Cosmological Killer (review) for the full story.)

A Case of Spontaneous Combustion is a story designed to showcase both sides of the Holmes that came to our world. On the one hand, he has a diabolical mystery to investigate, and on the other, he’s in the middle of a fight with his wife, and it’s affecting the case. It also becomes a minor case in its own right.

Holmes and his wife Skye have their first major argument. And it’s the kind of thing that looms large at the time, but could be quickly gotten over in the morning, when both tempers have cooled off a bit. Instead, Holmes gets hauled off to England, and his orders specifically exclude Skye and invoke the Official Secrets Act. He’s stuck and screwed (or not, as the case may be)

He gets to London, and almost immediately goes undercover to look for the terrorists who set off something in the middle of a small town that exploded all the inhabitants, and every other living thing for a radius of two miles, without harming any of the buildings.

Skye can’t reach him, and it’s literally more than his life is worth to call her. They both write letters trying to patch things up, but neither set of letters is getting through. Each thinks that they have been abandoned by the other, and that their marriage is over. They both descend into a certain amount of self-destructive behavior, while Holmes is undercover among the terrorists.

Things look like they are not going to end well. The case turns out to be much bigger, and considerably more dangerous, than was originally believed. By the end, Holmes and Skye’s bodies may be among the dead, if someone doesn’t solve their missing communications first.

Is it all part of the terrorist plot, or is there a spy in MI-5? Holmes needs Skye to save him from himself, and to figure out the high-level physics behind the mass spontaneous combustion.

Escape Rating B: I love this series. The whole concept of an alternate-world Sherlock Holmes works for me. He’s Holmes, but he’s not quite Conan Doyle’s Holmes, and that provides enough leeway for the ways that he’s different. In fact, a point in this story is that people keep equating the living Holmes with the fictional creation, and make assumptions that prove very, very wrong or hurtful, sometimes both.

There are two stories here; the marital tension being exacerbated by the missing communication, and the terrorist plot. I’ll admit that there were points where I wondered if they might somehow be part of the same plot, but there were different “baddies” for each one.

One issue with basing a series on whether or not a romantic relationship forms between the main characters is that a significant part of the dramatic tension can dissipate when the sexual tension is consummated. The depths to which both Holmes and Skye sunk as a result of their argument took over too much of the story. And it felt like a misunderstandammit that should have been resolved much more easily. The reasons behind the plot to keep them from communicating were a bit simplistic and it was easy to spot the perpetrator.

The terrorist case was much more nefarious, and it took longer to develop and to bring to a (temporary) close. Watching Holmes work his undercover magic in a contemporary setting was marvelous. Changing his identity and immersing himself completely in his role is a skill that translated well from one century to the next. But I think the ringleaders of this one will be back, and I’m looking forward to it.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: Dragons & Dirigibles by Cindy Spencer Pape

dragons and dirigibles by cindy spencer papeFormat read: ebook provided by NetGalley
Formats available: ebook
Genre: steampunk romance
Series: Gaslight Chronicles #7
Length: 125 pages
Publisher: Carina Press
Date Released: May 19, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, KoboAll Romance

When airship engineer Melody McKay’s dirigible explodes and plunges her into the yard of a gothic manor, she suspects foul play. With her ankle injured–an indignity far too feminine for her taste–she resolves to crack the mystery while in the care of Victor Arrington, the stuffy-yet-disarming Earl of Blackwell.

Ex-Royal Navy Captain Victor runs a tight house and is on a mission to protect his niece and foil a ring of smugglers using fire-breathing metal dragons. He has no time for romantic attachments. Particularly not with women who fall from the sky wearing trousers and pilot’s goggles.

As he and Melody navigate a treachery so deep it threatens the lives of everyone in Black Heath, the earl becomes unexpectedly attached to his fiery houseguest, and Melody discovers a softness in her heart for him. But when the smugglers strike, there’s more at risk than just their future together.

My Review:

Moonlight and mechanicals by Cindy Spencer PapeI’ve enjoyed the entire Gaslight Chronicles series, but it feels like the pinnacle of the series was Moonlight & Mechanicals (reviewed here). The plot was dastardly and far-reaching, and the hero and heroine were both up to the challenge. And the love story really sang.

Dragons & Dirigibles is fun, but doesn’t work quite as well, and I’m still trying to figure out why.

The plot definitely puts it into the middle of the long-running story of how the Knights of the Round Table continued through the centuries to reach this alternate Victorian era where Ada Lovelace really did manage to program Babbage’s engine. But by this point in the tale, we’ve not just met, but watched the adult children of the Hadrians, the Lakes and the Mackays find their intended match.

There’s one story left untold, but we’re teased about it at the end of Dragons & Dirigibles. Instead this is the story of engineer/pilot Melody Mackay, and her nearly-disastrous trip to Black Heath in a new stealth airship.

Melody and her ship accidentally run afoul of smugglers on the north coast, and she’s shot down–straight into the arms of the Earl of Blackwell. That’s where the story gets interesting. He’s hunting the smugglers, and thinks she might be one of them. He’s also incredibly conventional, and believes that women should be wives and mothers and nothing else. Certainly not pilots or engineers.

Melody thinks he has a stick up his arse the size of a ship’s mainmast, a totally appropriate simile because until just a few months previously, Victor Arrington was a naval captain. He inherited the title, the estate and his niece on the sudden death of his brother and sister-in-law. Melody is a complication that Victor doesn’t need, because his little niece is refusing to settle down and learn ladylike skills, and Melody’s presence is catnip to the child.

Also because he’s been trying to find where the smugglers are hiding, and not having much luck. Melody is either a conspirator or another target in the house. It takes him a while to figure out which. And even then, he still thinks she’s a bad influence on his niece.

Meanwhile, the village rumor mill is grinding on. The locals think that the new Earl is the smuggler, and that his niece is a feral child who caused the death of her parents. And that Melody is no better than she ought to be for staying in the house of a bachelor without a chaperone.

When she requests help from her family, and from the Order of the Knights of the Round Table, the situation goes even crazier.The smugglers have more secrets than just the location of their base. And their plans are much more dastardly than either the Earl, the Order, or the revenue agents off the coast could ever have imagined.

Escape Rating B: Melody is not a conventional woman, and she knows she isn’t going to be. What kept her from striking Victor with a blunt instrument in the first part of the book I’ll never know. It’s not just that he’s a prig and holds the views of his time, but that he’s frequently insulting about it into the bargain.

It’s not just that he doesn’t have a clue about what his niece wants and needs, but that he doesn’t have a clue that there is a clue to be had. It takes a lot of evidence for him to finally see the light, that women may not desire, or need the strictures that society places on them. And that the world changed quite a bit during the 10 years he was at sea.

Melody seems to fall in love with his niece long before she does him. Which makes sense, the little girl is a LOT nicer to her.

He does change, and figure things out, but the love story seemed a bit too pat, too formulaic, to really sing.

But the smuggling plot turned out to be quite ingenious, with quite the scary twist at the end. That part of the story had more layers to it than it seemed at the beginning. I figured out who one of the baddies was, but the other was a complete surprise.

I like the world that the author has created, and I’m looking forward to more stories. There’s been a simmering relationship for years, and I want to see that couple finally have their chance.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Memorial Day 2014

The U.S. Air Force Band plays the national anthem during a Memorial Day ceremony at the Memorial Amphitheater at Arlington
The U.S. Air Force Band plays the national anthem during a Memorial Day ceremony at the Memorial Amphitheater at Arlington

For those in the U.S., I hope you are having a terrific Memorial Day Weekend. For those outside the U.S., remember us when you have a Bank Holiday and we don’t.

Memorial Day began in the U.S. as a holiday to remember those who had died in the Civil War, from both sides of the conflict. It was later extended to honor all soldiers who have died while in the military, regardless of which conflict cost them their lives.

The Sunday Post AKA What’s on my (Mostly Virtual) Nightstand 5-25-14

Sunday Post

For everyone in the U.S., I hope you’re having a terrific Memorial Day weekend! It feels like it has been forever since our last 3-day weekend, and it’s about six weeks to the next one.

This coming week I had a chance to review some books that I just wanted to do, and discovered that a week isn’t nearly long enough!

Current Giveaways:

Little Island by Katharine Britton (paperback)

lovers at the chameleon club paris 1932 by francine proseBlog Recap:

A- Review: Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932 by Francine Prose
B Review: The Quick by Lauren Owen + Giveaway
B Review: Little Island by Katharine Britton + Giveaway
B+ Review: B.O.Q. by N.P. Simpson
B+ Review: Otherwise Engaged by Amanda Quick
Stacking the Shelves (90)

 

 

case of spontaneous combustion by stephanie osbornComing Next Week:

Dragons & Dirigibles by Cindy Spencer Pape (review)
A Case of Spontaneous Combustion by Stephanie Osborn (review)
Silver Skin by D.L. McDermott (review)
Unlocked: An Oral History of Haden’s Syndrome by John Scalzi

Stacking the Shelves (90)

Stacking the Shelves

Not a huge haul for this Memorial Day weekend, and that’s a good thing. Even better, the Bride books were seriously on sale this week. I read the first one in the series (What a Bride Wants by Kelly Hunter) and just couldn’t resist!

For Review:
The Awakening of Miss Prim by Natalia Sanmartin Fenollera
Bittersweet by Colleen McCullough
The Bookman’s Tale by Charlie Lovett
Dollbaby by Laura lane McNeal
The Guild of Assassins (Majat Code #2) by Anna Kashina
The Gunslinger by Lorraine Heath
Jumped (Aspen Valley #2) by Colette Auclair
The Mirror Empire (Worldbreaker #1) by Kameron Hurley
Truly (New York #1) by Ruthie Knox

Purchased:
Almost a Bride (Great Wedding Giveaway #3) by Sarah Mayberry
Second Chance Bride (Great Wedding Giveaway #2) by Trish Morey

Review: Otherwise Engaged by Amanda Quick

otherwise engaged by amanda quickFormat read: hardcover borrowed from the Library
Formats available: ebook, hardcover, paperback, audiobook
Genre: Historical romance
Length: 345 pages
Publisher: Putnam Adult
Date Released: April 22, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

Miss Amity Doncaster, world traveler, is accustomed to adventure and risk. Benedict Stanbridge, a man of science and a spy for the Crown, has faced danger in the darker corners of foreign lands.

But they are about to face a threat that is shockingly close to home …

One does not expect to be kidnapped on a London street in broad daylight. But Amity Doncaster barely escapes with her life after she is trapped in a carriage with a blade-wielding man in a black silk mask who whispers the most vile taunts and threats into her ear. Her quick thinking, and her secret weapon, save her … for now.

But the monster known in the press as the Bridegroom, who has left a trail of female victims in his wake, has survived the wounds she inflicts and will soon be on his feet again. He is unwholesomely obsessed by her scandalous connection to Benedict Stanbridge—gossip about their hours alone in a ship’s stateroom seems to have crossed the Atlantic faster than any sailing vessel could. Benedict refuses to let this resourceful, daring woman suffer for her romantic link to him—as tenuous as it may be.

For a man and woman so skilled at disappearing, so at home in the exotic reaches of the globe, escape is always an option. But each intends to end the Bridegroom’s reign of terror in London, and will join forces to do so. And as they prepare to confront an unbalanced criminal in the heart of the city they love, they must also face feelings that neither of them can run away from…

My Review:

I was vaguely disappointed that Otherwise Engaged is not part of The Ladies of Lantern Street series. I kept expecting the Arcane Society to make an appearance, but alas, it was not to be.

The lack of a supernatural element does not mean that Otherwise Engaged is lacking in suspense! We have a serial killer, an extensive cover up, madness the like of Sweeney Todd or Jack the Ripper, and a fake engagement between an intrepid globetrotter and a rookie spy.

What more could a reader ask for?

Amity Doncaster is the woman I think we’d all like to have been in the late 1800s. She is an absolutely fearless world traveler, visiting exotic places all over the globe as a completely independent woman. She supports herself by writing travel articles for the London newspapers, and the public breathlessly awaits her next adventure.

Then she meets Benedict Stanbridge in the Caribbean. She’s taking in the sights of a small island town during a cruise, and he’s bleeding to death in an alley. Not the most salubrious meeting in romantic history.

She rescues him. Not just by helping him get on board ship, but by doctoring his wounds and nursing him back to health. She saves his life. In return, there’s one kiss and his immediate transit to California as soon as they dock in New York.

She never expects to see him again, although she has hopes. Neither of which stand her in good stead when she returns to London and rumors start circulating that all the time she spent in his cabin was more intimate and less innocent than it truly was.

Those rumors make her the quarry of a serial killer who targets women in society circles who have supposedly given up their virtue. He may be mad as a hatter, but it is unfortunately an organized madness. The Bridegroom killer nearly makes Amity his next victim, but she outsmarts him with a concealed blade.

And into the midst of the ensuing drama and scandal, Benedict Stanbridge rushes back into Amity’s life. While his initial desire is to begin where they left off in New York, he believes that he needs to rescue her from the possibility of another attack. She won’t sit idly by while he does all the work; but she will let him assist in her investigation.

To divert the scandal, they agree to a fake engagement, but one that they both secretly hope will become real. It takes Benedict quite a lot of convincing, and several near-death experiences, to convince Amity that it is her that he really wants, for love and not just to protect her.

Escape Rating B+: The fake engagement trope, when it works, is one of my favorites. Two people who are supposed to be in love discover that they actually are. As a concept, the fake engagement works better in historicals than contemporaries, because it feels like there are more logical reasons to fake an engagement. The threat of scandal just isn’t what it used to be.

Amity and Benedict are terrific as the couple who can’t believe that anyone would love them. Amity is practical, sensible and off-the shelf. She’s also been the victim of a scandal, having once had a fiancee who was only interested in using her, then left her at the altar, starting her on her globetrotting adventures. She ran away from the scandal by seeing the world. She also believes herself to be terribly plain, and Benedict much too handsome for her own good.

Benedict is an engineer. He’s sure he’s much too boring for an adventurous woman like Amity. He also suffered from a broken engagement, with a woman who was only interested in him for his money and family connections, but found the man himself terribly boring. (She was a very stupid woman).

Forcing them together for the sake of investigating the Bridegroom Killer makes them get past the superficialities, and also binds them together through the shared experience of danger. Amity finds Benedict anything but boring–he’s a brilliant engineer and an amateur spy!

They need each other for balance, and they fall in love with the real person they are able to trust to guard their back, because they spend their fake engagement under threat from all sides. Falling in love is inevitable, but they are each the last person to see it.

The combination of the hunt for the serial killer with the search for the foreign agent involved in industrial espionage kept the suspense and danger ratcheted up for the entire story. Otherwise Engaged is breathtakingly fun!

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: B.O.Q. by N.P. Simpson

boq by np simpsonFormat read: print book borrowed from the Library
Formats available: ebook, hardcover
Genre: Mystery
Series: NCIS Special Agent Fran Setliff #1
Length: 243 pages
Publisher: John F. Blair, Publisher
Date Released: February 21, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Book Depository

People like Ann Buckhalter, the wife of a retired Marine lieutenant colonel, often stay at the Bachelor Officers’ Quarter (B.O.Q.) when they return to Camp Lejeune to visit friends or shop at the Exchange. But their dead bodies don’t end up floating in the nearby New River.

When Special Agent Fran Setliff and her Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) team investigate Ann’s murder, they soon discover that more than one person’s life has been simplified by the victim’s death.

As Fran delves into Ann’s background, she begins to glimpse the unsavory things that go on behind the camouflage curtain—racial and gender discrimination, unethical medical practices, sexual indiscretions. As a freelance journalist for the local civilian newspaper, Ann was in a position to ruin more than one promising military career. But who killed her?

In addition to the strong female character of Special Agent Setliff, the book is filled with interplay among various colorful individuals in the military ranks. Readers also gain insight into the strict hierarchy set up for military men and women and their spouses and children. Besides providing a behind-the-scenes look at the inner workings of a military base, B.O.Q. is a compelling detective story with an ending readers won’t see coming.

My Review:

The title is just a bit of a tease. Yes, I picked it up because it says its about an NCIS agent. While I knew perfectly well that it couldn’t represent any of the characters from the popular TV show (which I love) I was hoping for some of that same feel, even with a different set of characters.

What I got instead of was a good murder/mystery that involves military personnel and the closed culture that is created between a military base and the nearby town that is economically intertwined with it.

In other words, a case where everyone knows absolutely everyone, and everyone either owes everyone or hopes to get later favors from everyone. When there’s a “death in the family” under suspicious circumstances, the police come in as invaders to determine what went very, very wrong.

When the victim is part of the Navy or Marine “families”, or when the murder takes place on a Naval Base like Camp Lejeune, the special agents of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, in other words, NCIS are the cops that come to investigate the crime.

Fran Setliff is the special agent in charge of this particular case. And it is a humdinger. The wife of a retired Marine Lieutenant Colonel dies under very mysterious circumstances while she’s staying in the Bachelor Officers’ Quarters (B.O.Q.) at Camp Lejeune outside Jacksonville North Carolina.

The death looks like a bad case of death by misadventure, except for some very weird things. Ann Buckhalter drowned in a relatively shallow river. Somebody hit her on the head either before or after she died, or possibly both. And she’s a newspaper reporter.

Even as Agent Setliff unravels the layers upon layers of secrets that surround Ann Buckhalter’s life, the mystery about her death seems to just get deeper. The number of people who might have wanted her dead increases at every turn, but no one that comes to attention of the investigators actually seems to be the one who done it.

And Fran isn’t sure whether the Navy lawyer who is supposed to be aiding the investigation isn’t really there to keep the Base Commander out of political, or possibly homicidal, hot water. Or if that lawyer’s romantic pursuit of her is real or just another way of keeping the case (and the agent) muddled.

The mystery entangles everyone on the base, and as it unwinds, nearly everyone is a suspect. By the time the answer is revealed, secrets and careers are as dead as the victim. But the conclusion absolutely will keep you guessing until the very end.

Escape Rating B+: Don’t let the NCIS label fool you, B.O.Q. is a solidly good police procedural-type mystery in a military setting with a corkscrew of a case to solve. Evaluate it on its own merits.

Fran Setliff is an empathetic point of view character. She’s not part of the military (neither are most NCIS agents) but she is an intelligent and well-trained police officer. She has a case to follow, and she goes where the evidence leads her.

Sometimes, being the only female NCIS special agent in her area is an advantage, but mostly, it’s a pain in the ass. Which seems completely logical. She’s enmeshed in the problem of needing to be twice as good in order to be thought equal with the male agents, and she has a difficult time letting herself relax or quit thinking about (and living) her job.

The complications of this particular case are compounded, because the Base Commander is being sued for sexism in hiring and promotions, and there seems to be proof to back up the claims. Those allegations make him just one of the many possible murder suspects. People who are willing to cover up for him only add to that list.

Solving the case isn’t helped by the ways in which the victim played her military connections against her journalism career, and revealed secrets from both sides as it suited her purposes.

In the end, it feels as if there are no truly “good guys” in this case, just a lot of grey areas. But that’s what kept me guessing until the very end. I hope that I get to see Agent Setliff investigate more cases.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.