#BookReview: Hunter Squad: North by Anna Hackett

#BookReview: Hunter Squad: North by Anna HackettNorth (Hunter Squad) by Anna Hackett
Format: eARC
Source: author
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: action adventure romance, science fiction, science fiction romance
Pages: 210
Published by Anna Hackett on April 3, 2025
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazon
Goodreads

We survived the invasion and beat the aliens. But they left something behind…
I was born to protect. I’m a Connors, a soldier like my father before me, and I’m the medic for Hunter Squad. Every time we go out to hunt the mutated monsters the aliens left behind, I’m there to treat anyone who gets hurt.
But sometimes, I can’t always save everyone, and that haunts me.
When Hunter Squad is called out to rescue two missing boys, I’ll do anything to bring them home alive. Even work with our brand-new recruit, Jessica Ramos.
I’m not convinced she’s the right fit for the team, but she’s an expert when it comes to monsters. The creatures are exhibiting dangerous new behaviors, and we have to stop them. Whatever it takes.
Working alongside Jess, everything about her gets under my skin: her confidence, her intelligence, her fit, curvy body, and her damn freckles.
When old memories come back to haunt me, it’s Jess who helps me. Jess who draws me in a way no woman ever has. I can’t afford to let myself care for her.
Falling in love is not on my agenda.

My Review:

The first book in the Hunter Squad  series, Jameson, set up this world as it is 30 years after the Hell Squad series came to its explosive Independence Day style ending. This second book sets up the new BIG BAD, the whoever/whatever that is somehow managing to train bands of formerly dumb and disorganized Gizzida/terran hybrids into teams capable of planning, coordinating and outright luring the human defenders into what someone or something hopes they can turn into a no-win scenario – for the humans.

In other words, the fragile – not exactly peace but not outright war – that has existed since the “pure” Gizzida got knocked back into space is heating up from a simmer back to a boil. The hybrids aren’t merely on the move – they are on the attack. And they are suddenly a whole lot better at that than they used to be – which is absolutely not a good thing for the slowly rebuilding human population.

Hunter Squad, made up of the literal ‘next generation’ of the Hell Squad, has the necessary but unenviable task of hunting down packs of Gizzida/terran hybrids who are attacking human settlements. While that’s been their job for a while, it’s only on this particular hunt that they realize that lone humans have been disappearing on an increasing basis over the past several months – because they find out what happened to a few of them and it isn’t pretty.

It’s more like Shelob in The Two Towers – only worse. Because Shelob’s depredations were mostly – not totally but mostly – about the great spider protecting her own territory and maintaining her own food supply. Nature may be red in tooth and claw, but that’s what nature is supposed to be – even if humans still end up on the sharp and pointy end of that cliche a lot more than they’s like.

The unnatural spiderweb-like fuckery that Hunter Squad discovers in this second entry in the series doesn’t seem to be about preserving food – but it might be about preserving specimens for exactly the sort of lab experiments that the Gizzida used to do. The kind of experiments that created the hybrids that Hunter Squad is still fighting 30 years later.

Just as the overall situation is getting darker and more dangerous, a bright, hot light blazes through this story in the burn-the-sheets sex-into-love romance between Hunter Squad’s medic, North Connors, and the squad’s newest member, Jessica Ramos.

She doesn’t want to mess up her just barely started membership in Hunter Squad. It took a lot of time and effort to get from North America to Australia, and she has a lot of important research to do on the hybrids. She can’t afford to get sidetracked by a handsome face and the body to go with it.

Especially when that handsome face seems to scrunch up in distaste every time North lays eyes on her. She’s not remotely interested in a personal relationship with someone who can’t seem to stand her presence.

It’s going to take a crisis – or two or three – for North and Jessica to figure out that they’ve been reading each other’s signals very, very wrong all along.

Escape Rating B: As with Jameson, and with the original Hell Squad series, this story runs along on two distinct tracks that intersect at – ahem – climactic moments. There’s the big, overarching plot of the series, and then there’s the romance in this particular ‘chapter’ of that story.

The romance in this one is between North Connors, son of Ash Connors and Marin Mitchell, and Jessica Ramos, one of Cruz Ramos’ cousins from North America. So they both have history to live up to, which is clearly going to be a theme of this series. North is a medic, and Jessica hunts monsters in order to study them.

This isn’t exactly a relationship made in heaven – at least not at the beginning. He has demons when it comes to not being able to save ALL his patients. He’s afraid to get close to anyone – and he’s a bit of a dick about it because Jessica gets under his skin in ways he’s not comfortable with.

Jessica may be attracted to what he looks like, but his behavior is off-putting, because, well, he’s being a dick in ways that make her believe he doesn’t have any faith in her abilities. That they fall into bed anyway and eventually into love isn’t a surprise, exactly, but damn it happened really fast. I liked the romance in Jameson better because it wasn’t instalove the way this one turned out to be.

Very much on my other hand, I’m every bit as fascinated with the overall plot as I was with the first series. It makes so much sense that, just as the humans are rebuilding, the hybrids are as well. The invading Gizzida were just that, invaders from another world. They wanted to strip Earth of its resources and leave an empty husk behind. They HAD to be fought.

But the hybrids they left behind are entirely other matter. They weren’t Gizzida enough to die when the anti-Gizzida device went off, but they’re sure not acting like they are willing to coexist peacefully either. We don’t yet know what their actual imperative is – but I expect we’re about to find out.

Which is the scary but fun part of this series. The hybrids look like they’re experimenting on humans – both in the sense of how the humans react to threats and campaigns, and quite possibly in the sense of turning some into lab rats for nefarious and/or deadly purposes.

We certainly get hints of an intelligent hybrid watching from the shadows. And I’ll admit to wondering just how hybrid that hybrid is. There are other frightening possibilities which I can’t wait for the author to explore in later books in this series.

Based on hints at the end of this story, it’s clear that the next romance will be between quadcopter pilot Colbie Erickson and her Hunter Squad teammate Marc Jackson. And that their adventure is going to take them into the heart of at least one hybrid base or experimental lab – as well as deep into each other’s hearts. I’m looking forward to getting a glimpse of whoever or whatever is behind the uptick in monster intelligence and capability in the coming books in the series.

But that’s going to be a while, because the author’s next several books look like they will be contemporary romance and romantic suspense. As always, I’m looking forward to whatever romantic reading adventures this author is sending my way in the months to come!

A- #BookReview: Hunter Squad: Jameson by Anna Hackett

A- #BookReview: Hunter Squad: Jameson by Anna HackettJameson (Hunter Squad) by Anna Hackett
Format: eARC
Source: author
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: action adventure romance, science fiction, science fiction romance
Series: Hunter Squad #1
Pages: 186
Published by Anna Hackett on March 6, 2025
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazon
Goodreads

We survived the invasion and beat the aliens. But they left something behind…
Humanity is rebuilding after a devastating invasion. But the growing towns all have walls to protect them from the monsters. Created in alien labs, the monsters hide in the swamps, rivers, and forests—breeding, mutating. Every now and then, they crawl out of the shadows.
That’s where I come in. I’m Jameson Steele, the leader of Hunter Squad—the toughest group of soldiers in New Sydney. It’s our job to keep people safe and secure.
We’re the monster hunters.
When I get a panicked call from my childhood friend, Greer Baird, my usual cool goes out the window.
Greer’s an engineer working on a huge dam project that’s vital to our water supply. There’s a giant, deadly monster in the lake, it’s killed some of her people, and she’s in danger.
I’ve wanted Greer for a long time, but she’s too good for me: too smart, too driven, and out of my league.
But there is nothing I won’t do to protect her.
No monster I won’t hunt down to keep her safe.

My Review:

It’s been TEN YEARS since we first met Hell Squad, but it’s been THIRTY for them. Time flies when you’re having fun – and when you’re kicking slimy alien ass off our planet!

We first met the Hell Squad at the beginning of their series, just after the rampaging alien Gizzida had invaded Earth and were doing their damndest to strip this world of all of its resources.

Over the course of the 20-book series, the members of the Hell Squad and the survivors that gathered around a hidden military base in Australia’s Blue Mountains fought back against the Gizzida and finally managed to throw them back into space – with the help of hidden survivors at other bases around the world.

But the Gizzida didn’t go down easy – and they left plenty of trouble behind them. Including Gizzida/Terran hybrids that weren’t eliminated by the superweapon that eliminated the ‘pure’ Gizzida from the planet.

The Hunter Squad series opens thirty years after the end of the final book – and battle! – in the Hell Squad series. And that’s plenty of time for the children of those earlier heroes to be born, grow into adulthood, and take up the fight that their parents are still fighting – because the job’s not done until the last Gizzida hybrid burns. Or explodes. Or whatever works.

The books in the previous series were all about the combo of adrenaline chills and hot thrills of picking away at the Gizzida while one pair of heroes in each story finds the Happy For Now that they hoped could turn into a Happy Ever After – and they did. Based on this first entry in the new series, it looks like the Hunter Squad is planning to follow the same pulse-pounding pattern.

Hunter Squad leader Jameson Steele, the son of Marcus and Elle Steele, the protagonists of that very first book in the first series, has been in love with Greer Baird, the daughter of Shaw and Claudia Baird, the happy couple in book 7, quite possibly forever. Or at least the minute he noticed that Greer wasn’t just one of the guys – even if she absolutely can kick ass like one.

But Greer, like Jameson’s mother before her, is one of the brains in this band of survivors, and Jameson is definitely part of the brawn. The leader of it, in fact. But still, her leadership of one of the science/engineering teams that is helping put their civilization back together gives Jameson a really terrible case of the “I’m not worthy’s” – pretty much exactly like his dad felt around his mother.

So he’s been manfully pining from a respectable distance. He doesn’t want to mess up their deep friendship, and he honestly doesn’t want to hear her badass parents – after all, they helped save the whole entire planet – confirm what he’s always believed. That he’s not worthy of their daughter – even if he is. Of course he is, and not just because his parents are ALSO badasses who helped save the planet.

But when the latest generation of Terran-adapted Gizzida hybrid monstrosities come for Greer and her team on a remote project, it’s up to Jameson and the Hunter Squad to save the day, and the future, so he and Greer finally have a chance at their own HEA.

It’s the next-generation for both the Hell Squad AND the monsters they fought, and the rematch is already fantastic!

Escape Rating A-: Very much like that other “Next Generation”, this first book in the Hunter Squad series needs a bit of set up. For those of us who remember the Hell Squad series fondly but read it back when it came out, that setup serves as both a needed and absolutely desired bit of business, because we all loved those people, wanted them to get their collective HEAs and put Earth back on track. It’s fantastic to see how well they’ve done with the chances they created – and not at all surprising that there are still plenty of fields and aliens left to conquer.

For readers who are starting here – and one could (at least until the temptation to start at the beginning got to be too much) – that same setup gets a new reader stuck into this brave new world, hands over an informative scorecard to help a newbie figure out who they players are this time around, and generally introduces everyone, new and old, to the situation the survivors are in thirty years after they celebrated their Independence Day on the Gizzida.

And in the middle of that fantastic (re-)introduction, there’s a sexy friends-into-lovers romance between the two characters who are clearly going to be leading this new round of fighting, along with a forward-thinking technical project that is capable of moving the survivors’ return to civilization a great leap forward. If they can protect it from the undersea monster determined to suck it – and them – back into the depths.

If you’re wondering what the Gizzida were like, and speaking in a roundabout way about that other ‘Original Series’ and ‘Next Generation’, the Gizzida are what you’d get if the Gorn got assimilated by the Borg. Both the Gorn and the Borg were intelligent, space-faring species, so the resultant alien species is too. All the rapacious planet-stripping for resources of the Borg, with a bit more of the individuality – and the reptilian nature and appearance – of the Gorn.

However, the Gizzida/Terran hybrids the Gizzida created to adapt to life on Earth used a lot of Terran fauna in their hybridization, so they’re not as intelligent as their progenitors. Or at least they aren’t YET. As far as the surviving humans know. But I wouldn’t be at all surprised to discover that they are NOW, or are headed that way. We’ll see sooner or later, and I’d expect sooner.

Perhaps we’ll get a hint of that in the next book in the Hunter Squad series, North, coming early in April to an ereader or bookstore near you. Or at least one near me, because I can’t wait!

A- #BookReview: The Hero She Loves by Anna Hackett

A- #BookReview: The Hero She Loves by Anna HackettThe Hero She Loves (Unbroken Heroes, #5) by Anna Hackett
Format: eARC
Source: author
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: action adventure romance, contemporary romance, romantic suspense
Series: Unbroken Heroes #5
Pages: 216
Published by Anna Hackett on January 16, 2025
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & Noble
Goodreads

The last thing he wants is to hunt a dangerous fugitive in the Alaskan wilderness, especially with a tough, stubborn US marshal.
Parker Conroy moved to Alaska to be alone. His military career in Ghost Ops ended with an explosion and three torturous weeks of captivity. It’s left him scarred, wanting to avoid people, and hating being touched.
When US Marshal Jenna Sheriden knocks on his door, he has no time for the attractive marshal. But she isn’t taking no for an answer.
A dangerous fugitive is on the loose, and he happens to be a rogue Ghost Ops soldier.
Jenna Sheriden lives and breathes being a marshal. Her past has left her with something to prove. She has zero interest in love, relationships, or anything that slows her down.
She needs help hunting a deadly murderer. She needs Parker Conroy.
The gruff, lean loner radiates a dark intensity she can’t ignore, but he has the skills to help her track down her quarry. Thrust together, they’re sharing the same bed, the same tent, and working together every hour of the day.
As they draw closer to catching the killer, Jenna sees under Park’s scarred exterior to the man beneath. A man who tempts her in ways no one ever has before. A man who will do anything to keep her safe.
If they survive this hunt, then Jenna knows she’ll have the biggest challenge of all—convincing her scarred hero to take a chance on love.

My Review:

I was all in on The Hero She Loves from the very first page for two reasons. One, it’s an Alaska story and I always love stories set in “the 907” (Alaska’s Area Code – still) because I used to live in Anchorage. I still tell Alaska stories, so I enjoy it when someone else tells one to me.

Especially when it’s an author I love.

Second, I always love a romance of equals, especially when the female protagonist is every bit as proactive as her male partner. I want heroes who go out and get it done, not wait for someone to do it for them – especially when it comes to their own safety and rescue.

It’s okay to need a little help from a friend or a loved one, as US Marshal Jenna Sheriden certainly does, but it’s her duty to act and not merely react to situations just like the one she needs former Ghost Ops member Parker Conroy’s help WITH and not FOR.

One of Parker’s disgraced and dishonorably discharged former teammates has gone seriously rogue and it looks like he’s come to Alaska to get himself lost between murders. Alaska is a place where people really do go to lose themselves – but it’s a LOT more difficult to lose yourself when you pop out of hiding on a MUCH too regular basis to satisfy your need to rape and murder.

Still, Kyle Olson has the skills to continue his spree for entirely too long of a time. Jenna is excellent at what she does, but this bastard is seriously next level and she needs someone on that level to catch him. While Vander Norcross (his book is The Powerbroker), former head of Ghost Ops and still the badass ‘mother hen’ for all of them, knows that Parker Conroy is doing his damndest to lose himself in Alaska – albeit much more peacefully – and needs a way to expiate his own demons. Preferably on someone who really, really, deserves it.

Jenna needs Parker to help her catch Olson, Parker needs Jenna to bring him back from the wilderness. And Olson seriously needs to get caught. Or dead. Whichever. As long as he ends up somewhere he can’t manage to escape from. Again.

Escape Rating A-: Clearly, I went into The Hero She Loves expecting to enjoy it – and I absolutely did!

First, this does feel like the Alaska I knew through other people’s stories when I lived there. Anchorage is nothing like the Alaskan bush, and Valdez is tiny in comparison, a city of 4,000 compared to Anchorage’s not quite 300,000. (The local joke is that Anchorage is about 45 minutes from the “REAL” Alaska. Valdez is way closer than that.)

But still, it felt like the place I knew enough that nothing took me out of the story.

What made the story work for me is that Jenna was absolutely Parker’s equal, both for good and for bad. Not just that they’re equally badass and kickass in their own ways, but that they are each weighted down by emotional baggage trains filled with equally terrible demons. It’s not that they have the exact same demons, but that their demons are as big and bad as each other’s.

And neither of them believes that they can afford to look for love – let alone find it – no matter how much they both need it. And, of course, each other. Even if it does take a while for them to see it.

I found myself a bit torn, however, when it comes to the villains of this piece. There’s a little villain (and I mean that in any way that you might want to take it) in the person (using that term a bit loosely) of Jenna’s almost, sorta/kinda ex who just so happens to be her current boss in the Marshal service. He doesn’t even rise to the level of asshole. He’s just a little pisser. Repeatedly, often, and I’m surprised Jenna never gave in to at least dreaming about decking him. I want to say his actions and his character don’t ring true, but the problem is that they do – to the point where I’m left questioning her judgement a lot more than I’d like to. I wish he’d slunk away after he caused this entire debacle at the opening and I really wish he’d gotten exactly what he deserved at the end. But in real life, guys like him don’t. Dammit.

Howsomever, the real villain didn’t feel, well, real. While on the one hand that’s a head I’m really grateful not to have ever been in – I’d have hated reading anything from his perspective – at the same time he was so over the top he was mostly a caricature rather than a character.

On my third hand, the one behind my back, I’m not supposed to like him, he’s the villain. And I certainly did have a great time with Jenna and Parker visiting at least the vicinity of one my own old stomping grounds and watching them stomp all over someone who really deserved it even as they snuck into each other’s hearts.

The Hero She Loves marks the wrap of the author’s Unbroken Heroes series, barring any happy ever after all around epilogue – and I’d love to see one. I’m hoping that what comes next from this author is the first book in her NEW science fiction romance series, because those are always my favorites! We’ll certainly see in the months ahead.

#BookReview: The Hero She Deserves by Anna Hackett

#BookReview: The Hero She Deserves by Anna HackettThe Hero She Deserves (Unbroken Heroes) by Anna Hackett
Format: eARC
Source: author
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: action adventure romance, contemporary romance
Series: Unbroken Heroes #4
Pages: 252
Published by Anna Hackett on December 4, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazon
Goodreads

When he goes to investigate a blaring smoke alarm, the last thing he expects to find is Hollywood’s hottest actress…naked.
Deputy Sheriff Sawyer Lane likes the pace of life on Maui. After years as a Navy SEAL and in Ghost Ops, he likes that no one shoots at him. Coming to the island saved him. He still can’t sleep, but he’ll take the sun, sand, and solitude.
Then Oscar-winning actress Hollis Stanton rents the house next to his and torpedoes his solitude. When she sets her coffee machine on fire, he meant to help, not see every glorious inch of her from her russet-red hair to her red-painted toenails.
Soon, they’re running into each other everywhere, and it doesn’t take all of Sawyer’s finely-honed skills to know she’s in trouble and hiding from something. Or someone.
Hollis Stanton usually loves her life—movie roles she enjoys, an Oscar on her mantel, financial security. She’s come a long way from the poor, gangly redhead in hand-me-down clothes. But one stupid party held by a powerful movie producer changes everything.
She accidentally overhears something she shouldn’t have.
Now, someone is following her, breaking into her house, and crashing into her car. Her plan is to lay low in Hawaii. What wasn’t in her plan is the big, muscular, and rugged deputy sheriff next door. Nor is their scorching attraction.
When danger closes in, Hollis realizes Sawyer is the real deal—a hero with scars, who helps those in need.
A hero who will do anything to protect her.

My Review:

And she absolutely does. After all the fake heroes she’s played opposite in all of her movies, Oscar-winning actress Hollis Stanton deserves a real hero of her own just when she needs him the most.

Even if, at first, she’s not willing to admit that she needs anyone to keep her safe, or that Deputy Sheriff Sawyer Lane is the hero she’s been holding out for all along. For more than just the present danger.

(And yes, I invoked that earworm deliberately. If this story doesn’t make Bonnie Tyler’s “Holding Out for a Hero” ring through your head, here’s the video to fix that. You’re welcome.)

One of the unfortunate things about information and cellphone cameras being available everywhere, all the time, is that a person can run but they literally cannot hide, at least not if they’re a movie star like Hollis Stanton.

Hawaii, like Alaska still is to some extent, used to be a place that was so far out there – far out in the Pacific Ocean – that once upon a time a person could run away from themselves and whatever demons were literally chasing them.

Of course, the demons that were only figuratively chasing them, the demons inside their own heads, came right along with them. After all, no matter where you go, there you are.

Hollis Stanton is being chased by very real demons. She overheard something she shouldn’t have at a party hosted by a shady Hollywood mogul, and then weird shit started happening around her. So she ran, to the house of a friend outside the tiny village of Paia, on Maui. She covered her tracks as best she could, but she’s a hot commodity and anyone who sees her instantly recognizes her.

Sawyer Lane, very much on the other hand, left the SEALs and Vander Norcross’ Ghost Ops team with a whole lot of demons. But Sawyer’s demons are inside him, and he brought them along with him to Paia.

The place, the job, the friends he’s made there are helping him lay those demons to rest, but it’s a long process that still gives him plenty of sleepless nights. Like all of the nights. Still.

At least until the fire alarm goes off in the ‘vacation home’ down the road, and his sometime neighbor calls Sawyer to ask him to go down and check it out. And finds himself checking out Hollis Stanton, ALL of Hollis Stanton, standing on a teetering chair in just a slipping towel trying her damndest to shut the damn thing off.

It’s already too late for her coffee maker. And it’s too late for Sawyer Lane – and Hollis, too – they just don’t know it yet. And might not survive the conflagration to come.

Escape Rating B: Just like the story reminded me of “Holding Out for a Hero”, the hero in the story reminds Hollis Stanton of the hero of the Jack Reacher TV series. The book’s cover does a damn good job of leading the reader in that same direction, although your reading and TV viewing mileage may both vary.

One of the things that I’ve loved about all the entries in the Unbroken Heroes so far, The Hero She Needs, The Hero She Wants and The Hero She Craves (and if you’re sensing a theme here you’re right) is that the heroines get their rescue parties started all by themselves. Not that the heroes don’t help a LOT, but the women of this series have all been active – and effective – participants in everything that happens around them.

Hollis, in spite of her timely escape to Maui, has a bigger set of blinders on than the others. Or she’s a bit more naive or has been just a shade too overprotected and oversheltered as a Hollywood star – in spite of her hard-knock start in life.

She keeps thinking she’s escaped when it’s clear that she hasn’t. To the point where I wanted to hit her with a clue-by-four before the story did it for me.

OTOH, Sawyer fit right in with the rest of Vander Norcross’ former Ghost Ops. Which reminds me, for such a badass, Vander (his book is The Powerbroker) is one hell of a mother hen. And seems to have always been one. It’s a fascinating combination.

The interesting thing about this romance is that both Sawyer AND Hollis have serious cases of the “I’m not worthies” and yet, it works BECAUSE they both do. He has demons from his service – as all the men from the Ghost Ops team have unsurprisingly had so far. Her demons are old and familiar – also familial. Her mother STILL doesn’t appreciate, approve or understand – but is more than willing to make demands and milk her daughter for money at the drop of a hat.

Like the rest of the Unbroken Heroes series, The Hero She Deserves is a story where the hero and the heroine rescue each other from demons that they initially weren’t willing to even admit that they couldn’t handle themselves.

That justice was finally served and evil got its just desserts turned out to be the icing on an excellent reading cake, as have been all the books in this series, and absolutely the author’s work in general.

There’s one more Ghost Ops member left for Vander Norcross to mother hen into his happy ever after, and we’ll get that story early next year. It looks like this last entry in the series, The Hero She Loves,  will be set in Alaska, so I’m especially looking forward to it!

#BookReview: Fury Brothers: Claim by Anna Hackett

#BookReview: Fury Brothers: Claim by Anna HackettClaim (Fury Brothers Book 5) by Anna Hackett
Format: eARC
Source: author
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: action adventure romance, contemporary romance, romantic suspense
Series: Fury Brothers #5
Pages: 240
Published by Anna Hackett on October 17, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazon
Goodreads

It was only supposed to be one night—a hot, nameless encounter with the gruff, gorgeous older stranger.
When you’re on the run from a killer, you can’t afford attachments. For over a year, I’ve been alone, never staying in one place long, fighting to survive.
But when the tall, muscled man with the intriguing ink steps in to help me with an obnoxious admirer, we end up sharing a coffee. Coffee turns into the hottest night of my life.
I never expected to see him again.
But when I walk into Hard Burn—the best gym in New Orleans—desperate to learn how to fight, I discover my stranger is none other than Beauden Fury.
When Beau discovers I’m being hunted, I see the true depth of his protective streak. He gives me a job, and says he’ll train me to protect myself. But he also makes it clear that he thinks I’m too young, too vulnerable, and too nice for him.
Now we’re spending hours together, side by side, and it’s hard to remember that I can’t let myself get too close. It’s even harder to fight our red-hot desire.
But the man hunting me hasn’t given up.
Can I defeat a killer, and prove to Beau that what we have is worth fighting for?

My Review:

Claim is the fifth and most likely the final book in the Fury Brothers series (barring any epilog-type short stories) – because there are five Fury Brothers and as this book opens, Beauden Fury is the only brother left standing alone. Not that THAT lasts long after the woman he knows only as Bell walks into his New Orleans gym and pretty much demands that he train her to fight.

So she can fight back against the literal demon that is chasing her. Not that Beau knows what – or rather who – is driving her. Just that he’s certain that something is. Because the morning after they met in some tiny town in the middle of nowhere – and spent one glorious night together – she fled without a trace, leaving nothing but a sweet memory he can’t get out of his head and a name that isn’t nearly enough to track her down with – if it’s even hers at all.

He thought it was for the best. He’s convinced that he’s too old, too rough and too broken for her.

As much as her night with Beau was the best, safest, ANYTHING she’d had since she went on the run, Bell thought it was best to leave because it’s too dangerous for anyone she gets close to. Chandler Carr, the serial killer chasing her down and tormenting her every step is toying with her, his prey, as he runs her down – the only one who ever got away.

Bell comes to New Orleans because she always wanted to see the city – and because her would-be killer found her in Pensacola. She’s in Beau’s gym because she needs the best to train her to fight back – because if she can’t fight back and fight hard the next time Carr catches up with her it will be her death. The notes he’s left her – no matter how far or how fast she runs – make that frighteningly clear.

No matter how much Beau and Bell each tell themselves that the other would be better off without them – they can’t keep their hands off each other and can’t resist falling hard for each other. Even though they each believe that their relationship is best if it’s only temporary – until Carr is out of the picture.

Of course, they are both wrong, Wrong, WRONG! The question is just how big of an idiot one or both of them will have to be before they figure out that they belong together.

If Carr lets them live that long.

Escape Rating B: Readers of the Fury Brothers series will see echoes from the first book, Fury, in this final book. Mila Clifton was being chased by the mob in that first book after witnessing a murder. Bell is being chased by a serial killer after she witnessed him leaving her apartment and discovered that he’d murdered her roommate.

Neither woman was responsible for the mess that they found themselves in – and both of them were on the run because anyone they got close to got dead. Both of them get involved with the Fury Brothers because they’ve moved into the Fury orbit and have each met someone who can’t resist protecting them. And because they can’t resist their protector no matter how much they think they should.

The ‘heroine in jeopardy reacting by running’ trope is not one of my favorites. But it works for the Fury Brothers, in both cases, because in spite of it being a cliché it doesn’t descend into one. Bell is not TSTL. She doesn’t do anything stupid – although there’s a point where the reader thinks she might have that turns out MUCH better.

Neither is remotely responsible for the fix they’re in – not by any standard of guilt except possibly their own. And in neither case is their pursuer an EvilEx(™). I personally hate those stories.

Claim does run straight into another trope that can go pear-shaped, but in this case fits well within the setup of the series as a whole AND gets its comeuppance in very short order once Carr is out of the picture, and that’s the “I’m not worthy” trope. At first they’re both suffering from it as Bell’s presence does paint a target on anyone she gets close to, while Beau thinks he’s not worthy of anyone’s love because of the addict parents he ran away from. (The Fury Brothers have all had a bit of an issue with the “I’m not worthy” thing for reasons that are clear in their stories, so this isn’t out of left field. Also, Bell does a great job of separating Beau’s head from his ass as soon as their situation is resolved.

Very much like my reaction to that first book, I liked this one in spite of myself. The description had me worried that it was going to dive into a whole bunch of tropes that I’m not all that fond of, but it didn’t and the blend of if not going to any of the places I worried about while wrapping up this marvelous series of found family stories AND telling a hot romance set in a fascinating city absolutely did work for this reader.

#BookReview: Fury Brothers: Take by Anna Hackett

#BookReview: Fury Brothers: Take by Anna HackettTake (Fury Brothers #4) by Anna Hackett
Format: eARC
Source: author
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: action adventure romance, contemporary romance, romantic suspense
Series: Fury Brothers #4
Pages: 251
Published by Anna Hackett on September 5, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazon
Goodreads

I share a perfect kiss with a handsome stranger…only to find out that he’s my brother’s best friend.

New Orleans is an exciting new start for me. When I’m not in my lab working on my project, I’m determined to enjoy all the city has to offer. That’s how I ended up at a party hosted by the Fury Brothers.

That’s how I ended up kissing Reath Fury. Six-feet something of dark, handsome, and gorgeous.

When Reath finds out I’m the little sister of his best buddy from the military, he’s not happy.

But then I get attacked in my lab. Someone is after my project. Did I mention I have top-secret military funding? Turns out some very bad people plan to auction my work to the highest bidder.

Now Reath vows to keep me safe. The former CIA agent gives new meaning to the words overprotective and bossy. But spending every hour of the day together makes it impossible to keep our hands off each other.

We agree to keep it our little secret—all sex, no emotions allowed.

But the criminal after my project has a history with Reath, and he’s out for revenge. My brother’s best friend, the man who tells me he doesn’t do love, is the only one who can protect me.

And the only one who can break my heart.

My Review:

They chose to call themselves Fury because that’s what they were when they bonded. All five – at that point VERY young men were in foster care. They were all, individually and collectively, furious at their treatment in the foster home when they met and bonded.

Because their so-called carer was a man who liked to take young male foster kids and break them. He enjoyed beating them to a pulp – because he could. Reath was his special target, because Reath was the youngest and smallest of the quintet – and because he was black and pretty.

But a man who can beat up and beat down one kid can’t necessarily take on five absolutely furious young men who have no one and nothing but each other. Together, Dante, Colton, Kavner, Beauden and Reath got back a whole lot of their own and left – bonded together and filled with fury.

Fast forward a whole lot of years. Those boys are now very successful men – not in spite of what they came from but because of it – and because of each other.

As the saga of the Fury Brothers and the piece of New Orleans they claim as their own has shown, Dante (Fury), Colt (Keep), Kavner (Burn) and now Reath have each been chased down and pretty much ambushed by love – in spite of every single one of them so far proclaiming to all and sundry that love is the last thing they need or deserve. Ever.

Reath Fury is not going to be the exception – no matter how much he thinks he is. He’s not going to be exempted from his brothers’ ribbing him about it, either.

Or, as it turns out, her brother’s – even though the “bro code” is one of the biggest things Reath thinks is standing in the way of any possible relationship between himself and his best friend’s all-too-grown-up little sister.

But Frankie Parker isn’t going to let the ‘bro code’, her overprotective brother, or even a whole gang of mercenaries led by Reath’s literal worst enemy keep her from what she has set her sights on.

Her first goal is to keep her genius biochemistry project out of the hands of anyone who would turn it to terrible ends. Her second goal is to get a reluctant Reath Fury to admit that not only does he have a heart – but that it is already all hers.

Escape Rating B: Take returns to what seems to be the standard pattern for the Fury Brothers series. There is nothing wrong with patterns, they can work very well. Tropes exist for a reason, after all.

The pattern in this series is that the female protagonists start the story out already in trouble – even if, as is the case of Frankie Parker in this story – she doesn’t know it yet. And she should have – or at least have considered the possibility.

It is possible that Frankie simply hasn’t read nearly enough science fiction, or seen enough of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, because she’s had her nose to the grindstone concentrating on her work. Her genius project – and it absolutely is a genius project – screams “super soldier serum” at high decibel volume with a whole phalanx of flying bullets to go with it.

Which is where Reath comes in. Frankie is in trouble. There really are some very bad people out to get her, to take her research – AND her – and sell both to the highest bidder. Because every villain in every world wants to make super soldiers and her project is a shortcut to that particular hellish road.

Reath and Frankie both have reasons for not wanting to get involved. Both have done their damndest to put their hearts on ice and both have succeeded at that terrible ambition entirely too well – except where their respective siblings are concerned.

But as has happened in the rest of this series, Frankie needs protection and Reath can’t seem to resist providing that protection. Then again, he can’t resist Frankie, either, and the feeling is very, very mutual.

They just have to get the villains out of the way first. Which turns out to be a bit more of a challenge than Reath and the rest of his brothers imagined. But they still get the job done.

As much as I liked the characters, and I adore the New Orleans setting, there were a couple of things in this story that tripped me up a bit. As I said, I found it a bit difficult to believe that Frankie didn’t know that her project was obviously capable of being weaponized even if that was not her intention. Likewise, the replacement lab where the climactic kidnapping took place was a screamingly obvious set up.

(Maybe I’ve read too much science fiction. Nah…)

So, a couple of things in this one didn’t quite work for me, but I had a good reading time and I still very much enjoy the series as a whole. Which is a good thing, as there’s one Fury brother – and therefore one book – left in the series. Claim, presumably Beauden Fury’s story, is coming in October. And then the author is on to the book I’ve been waiting for all year, the (still untitled) start of her next Sci-fi Romance series. I can’t wait!

A- #BookReview: Sentinel Security: Stone by Anna Hackett

A- #BookReview: Sentinel Security: Stone by Anna HackettStone (Sentinel Security #7) by Anna Hackett
Format: eARC
Source: author
Formats available: ebook
Genres: action adventure romance, contemporary romance, romantic suspense
Series: Sentinel Security #7
Pages: 141
Published by Anna Hackett on July 25, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazon
Goodreads

He’s the new silver fox recruit at Sentinel Security. The hot, tough former Marine Raider. And he won’t touch her because he works with her brother.

Real estate agent Magnolia “Nola” Newhouse has it all. Okay, not *quite* all. She loves her work, has a growing collection of designer heels, and is about to become an aunt…she’s just missing the love of her life. She’s watched her brother and her best friend fall in love, and Nola wants that too.

When she first sees the big, rugged silver fox across the bar, she feels an instant connection, and knows he does too. They share a passionate kiss, then he discovers who her brother is…

Former Marine Knox “Stone” Holman needed a change. He’s left California and taken a job at New York’s top security firm: Sentinel Security. What he never expected was to lay eyes on a tiny, curvy woman and feel his world tip upside down. But Knox lives by a code, which means his co-worker’s beautiful sister is off-limits. Besides, Nola has love, marriage, and kids stamped all over her, and he’s past that.

But when Nola goes to inspect an empty penthouse and accidentally witnesses an execution-style murder, everything changes. She’s on the run and being hunted by the mob, and Knox will do everything to keep her safe.

Running the gauntlet of the New York streets, Knox and Nola will discover just how hot their attraction runs. Knox is determined to protect her, and Nola is determined to make him hers.

My Review:

The Sentinel Security series opened with Wolf back in 2022, so it seems fitting that the series close with him too. Well, sorta/kinda and not exactly. But it’s all in the family.

Back in that first story in the series, Wolf fell hard and fast for his little sister’s bestie – not that they aren’t both adults when that story takes place.

In this wrap-up novella for the series, it’s Wolf’s little sister Nola’s turn to find her HEA with one of his friends and colleagues, the newest member of the Sentinel Security family, Knox Holman, codename Stone from his own days as an elite operative for MARSOC, the Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command.

The sparks fly between Stone and Nola from their very first meeting – just before he’s introduced to his new team and learns that the woman he kissed up against the wall should be off-limits. A limit he’s determined to keep.

But their second meeting is a lot less cute, and throws all of both of their cautions out the window. That second meeting takes place behind a dumpster, where Nola is crouching to hide from the bad guys she just saw commit cold blooded murder in a high-end NYC apartment she was originally oh-so-thrilled to be contracted to sell.

On the run from her pursuers, chased at every turn, shot at at every opportunity, Stone and Nola have to hole up in one of Sentinel Security’s safehouses while their friends clear them a path to safety.

Even if it means breaking down doors, jumping through broken windows, and figuring out that no matter how much they should keep each other at arms’ length they’re both MUCH happier being held close.

Escape Rating A-: It looks like this is the really truly last and final entry in the Sentinel Security series after last year’s Hex. Not that we won’t see these folks again riding to someone’s rescue at some point in the future. (Something this author does that all her readers are grateful for, as it gives us an opportunity to see how our friends are doing!)

Still, this is the wrap-up novella and it does a terrific job of wrapping up. All the Sentinel Security agents have found their HEAs, sometimes even with each other, but we met Nola back in that first book and she still needed to find someone just for her.

Enter Stone, who is just what she’s been looking for, even if neither of them has a clue. Stone doesn’t even have a clue that he’s looking!

The romance in this one combined a couple of my favorite tropes, so two great tastes that went deliciously together.

First and foremost, Nola isn’t passive about her rescue – EVER. She’s on the run when she calls in her 911 to Sentinel Security, she’s preparing to fight back when Stone catches up to her, and she’s prepared to fight or fly the minute either of them sees trouble.

What made the story extra yummy for this reader is that it’s an age gap romance, and that’s always a favorite for me – no matter which direction that gap is in. That gap causes insecurities and questions and worries about the differing lengths of the emotional baggage train that each person has trailing behind them – as well as the places that they currently are in their lives and what they have in front of them.

Something that’s particularly true in this case as Nola is in her early 30s and the alarm on her biological clock is going off, while Stone, in his late 40s, tried marriage once, believes that the failure of it was all on him, and doesn’t think he has it in him to try again.

What made it work was that in spite of the 15+ year gap between them, they’re both more than mature enough to at least think they know what they want out of life and that it might not be the same thing.

Although we all hope they figure out that it is before the story and the series wraps. And of course they do.

This series has been fun, and it came to the perfect fireworks and explosions and happy ever after conclusion. The author is in the midst of her newest action adventure romance series, Unbroken Heroes, and will be returning to her Fury Brothers series in the fall with Take (Sept.) and Claim (Oct.) – but I’ll confess that as much as I’m looking forward to catching up with the Fury Family, the book I’m really anticipating is the opener for her new Sci-Fi Romance series in November!

A- #BookReview: Guard the East Flank by M.L. Buchman

A- #BookReview: Guard the East Flank by M.L. BuchmanGuard the East Flank: a military romantic suspense (Night Stalkers Reload Book 1) by M L Buchman
Format: ebook
Source: author
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genres: action adventure romance, military romance
Series: Night Stalkers Reload #1
Pages: 358
Published by Buchman Bookworks on July 1, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads


Emily Beale returns! And the Night Stalkers will never be the same.

Captain Sharelle Vargas may be the best pilot in the 160th SOAR helicopter regiment, but is she ready for Colonel Emily Beale?
Captain Troy Ryland loves three things in his his family farm, flying the most lethal helicopter in the US military, and the woman he flies with. Each pull him in a different direction. The clock isn’t ticking—it’s running out!
A new mission slams them into action as they must infiltrate the notorious “Wind from the East”—Russia. Once in, will their combined skills prove enough to escape with their lives and their hearts intact?
“(For) fans of Suzanne Brockmann, Maya Banks, Catherine Mann, and Kaylea Cross.” – Booklist
“OMG, I love how this guy writes military romantic suspense!!” – Smitten with Reading

My Review:

Lieutenant Colonel Emily Beale was a legend among the Night Stalkers. And so she should be, considering her many, many firsts and achievements and successful missions. (If you want details – and you should if you love military romance! – check out the original Night Stalkers series that began with The Night is Mine.)

The thing about legends is that people generally expect them to be dead. Or at least retired. Definitely past their prime.

But Emily Beale is none of the above. She’s clearly not dead, she’s still on active duty, and she’s not in the least past her prime. It’s just that her missions have shifted from overt to so covert they are black-in-black, while she seemingly spends her days and her time and her energy running Henderson Ranch and it’s many, many side-businesses with her husband, Lieutenant Colonel Mark Henderson (retired) and raising their tween daughters.

It’s a good life. It’s a happy life. And it’s a fulfilling life. Well, it is for Mark. For Emily – not quite so much. Almost, but not quite.

Which is when and where Colonel Cassius McDermott, the current commander of the Night Stalkers, drops into Henderson Ranch with an offer that Emily Beale both does and doesn’t want to refuse. Cass is being promoted out of the job he’s held for the past decade. The Night Stalkers need someone who knows the command from the inside out AND has the necessary intelligence and experience to think outside the box – because 21st century warfare no longer takes place inside that box.

The Night Stalkers need Emily Beale to step up and take the reins – at least long enough to prepare someone to follow the trail that she’ll blaze. Again.

Escape Rating A-: There are two – or maybe it’s three – plot points circling the skies in this first book in the Night Stalkers Reload series.

(If you haven’t read the original series, it is marvelous and well-worth a read. Howsomever, you don’t have to read it first to get into this one. As with many romance series, it’s the setting and the setup that carries over from book to book – or series to series – and not the main characters. Not that previous main characters don’t appear in later books or later series, but you don’t have to know – or remember – all the deets about what happened before to get into what’s happening now. Of course, that doesn’t mean you won’t WANT to, but you don’t HAVE to.)

Back to those plot circles. The first, biggest and most obvious is the return of Emily Beale to the Night Stalkers. Not because she takes over the story, but she does take command, links long-term readers back to the original series – and, and most importantly – shows Beale as a woman at mid-career AND midlife caught between a huge rock and a ginormous hard place that seems real to any woman caught in that middle – even if they aren’t or weren’t an elite fighter pilot.

Emily loves her family, loves the life they’ve built, is mostly satisfied with the way things are and feels all of her commitments very strongly. Those black-in-black operations that she handles intelligence and analysis for keep her hand in without taking her away from the life she’s built.

But she’s not done, not intellectually and not emotionally. Her husband has retired from the military because their life at Henderson Ranch satisfies him all the way down to his toes. That’s not true for Emily. And yet, she doesn’t want to go back into the field.

Which doesn’t mean that there isn’t something missing in her life. Just as there will be something missing if she takes command of the Night Stalkers. Either choice leaves her half-bereft and full of regrets.

It’s so easy to feel for her dilemma. The specifics of her choice aside, the fact that she has to choose is very true-to-life. And that eventually realizes that she can’t handle the huge task before her without help – both from her family and from the people she commands and serves with.

At the same time, as with all of the books in the Night Stalkers series, there are two other plots that move from the foreground to the background as the story follows the early months of Emily’s command.

Both of those storylines rotate around Captains Sharelle Vargas and Troy Ryland, the present-day number one pilot team in the 160th SOAR. Their relationship is in flux in multiple ways. They’ve been carrying torches for each other since the day they were assigned together – three long years ago. But Troy knows that he’s a short-timer, getting out after 10 years to return to his family’s struggling farm. And he knows that Sharelle is in until the day they take her wings – or rotors – away.

A relationship is impossible – or it should be. But even as Troy’s contract is winding down, their romance is heating up.

And so is the danger of the black-in-black mission they’ve been assigned – to disrupt the supply chain between North Korean arms manufacturers and the Russian military fighting in Ukraine. All they’ll have to do is sabotage the Trans Siberian Railway using stolen Russian helicopters in Russian airspace with no one being the wiser – not even on their own side. Ever.

The mission is fascinating – and perhaps just a tiny bit prescient – which is scarier than any reader will want to admit. The romance is very much in the author’s trademark style in that it is a relationship of absolute equals in every possible way. Even if Troy has a bit of the misunderstandammits – not with Sharelle, but with his own hopes, dreams and particularly his obligations. For a really smart man – which he is – the situation he’s put himself into is pretty much the opposite.

But he does finally get his brain in gear along with his heart, leading to a terrific happy ending for the romance, even as the future of the Night Stalkers begins to wrap itself around his partner.

I’ve been a fan of this author since I read the very first Night Stalkers book, The Night is Mine, back in 2012. This series – and all of the author’s other series that I’ve dipped into and/or devoured over the years – have always been an excellent reading time – and this first entry in the Reload series absolutely did not buck that trend.

If you’re a fan of military romance in particular, or if you are just jonesing for a romance where the characters are always standing on equal ground – in spite of or because of whatever emotional baggage they may be trailing behind them – Buchman is a author who always delivers no matter the setting or setup. This reader will certainly be back for the next book in the Night Stalkers Reload series whenever it appears – and in the meantime I’m definitely looking forward to the next book in the Miranda Chase series, Wedgetail, coming this Fall!

A- #BookReview: The Hero She Craves by Anna Hackett

A- #BookReview: The Hero She Craves by Anna HackettThe Hero She Craves by Anna Hackett
Format: eARC
Source: author
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: action adventure romance, contemporary romance
Series: Unbroken Heroes #3
Pages: 248
Published by Anna Hackett on June 13, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsiteAmazon
Goodreads

The last thing he expects on his ship is the off-limits woman he can’t stop thinking about—his best friend’s daughter.
After a tough military career as a Navy SEAL, and a member of a covert Ghost Ops team, Lorenzo “Ren” Santoro now calls a research ship home. The ocean, very few people, and solitude…it’s all he needs.
Then as a favor to his best friend, he agrees to take a research team to sea to test a top-secret Navy project. He’s shocked to discover his best friend’s daughter is one of the scientists. The beautiful Halle Bradshaw who Ren once kissed, who ignites a powerful craving inside him. She’s too young, too innocent, and too off-limits.
When strange things start happening to Halle, Ren suspects she’s in danger…and he’ll do anything to keep her safe.
Marine biologist Halle loves the ocean, her work…and Ren Santoro. Being aboard his ship, she finally has the chance to show the stubborn man how good they could be together.
But someone is targeting the highly classified project she’s working on. One she can’t let fall into enemy hands.
The only person she can trust is Ren. Forced to abandon their ship, they will face the danger of the sea and the wilds of a jungle-covered island, all while being hunted by a relentless enemy.
Ren and Halle will no longer be able to hide from their white-hot desire or their demons. She’s determined to convince him to take a chance on love…but first, they have to survive.

My Review: 

Some tropes are classics for a reason, and The Hero She Craves wonderfully illustrates every single one of those reasons for one of my absolute faves.

There’s a bit of an age gap between former Navy SEAL Lorenzo “Ren” Santoro and Halle Bradshaw. And so there should be, as Halle’s dad is Ren’s mentor AND best friend. Tom Bradshaw saved Ren’s life when a young, tough, and let’s face it, dumb Ren tried to steal the older man’s car.

Instead of turning him in, Tom Bradshaw turned Ren’s life around, which means that Ren was around to watch Halle turn from a sulky, grieving teen after the loss of her mom in an automobile accident, to a beautiful woman that he knows he should keep his hands off of.

At her 20th birthday party, he didn’t. It’s been three years and neither of them has ever been able to forget that one, searing kiss. The one that marked both of their hearts – even if Ren is too caught up in guilt – and the damn ‘bro code’ to admit it – while Halle is just a bit too innocent to go out and get her man.

But those  three years later, Halle’s tired of waiting for Ren to quit avoiding her and the tension simmering between them. She’s a marine biologist, he’s the second-in-command of the research ship her team has contracted with for their latest round of experiments with a highly experimental – and sought after – submersible.

She thinks she’ll have all the time in the world to pin him down. He thinks he only has to avoid spending too much time with his greatest temptation for four days and then he can go back to avoiding the inevitable.

The forces that want to steal the submersible – a device that is even more revolutionary than Ren and his captain were originally told – have put Halle in their crosshairs as the weak link in the device’s security.

But Halle’s not weak at all – not with Ren to protect her from the very, very bad guys. Especially when he finally gets hit with the clue by four that the last thing he ever needs to protect her from is himself.

Escape Rating A-: Three books in, I have to say that I’ve enjoyed the first two books in the Unbroken Heroes series, The Hero She Needs and The Hero She Wants, but this is the first one where I’ve got to admit that this time around I fell hard for the cover, too.

That being said, the story in this entry in the series combines something that has been a feature in the whole series so far with one of my favorite romance tropes.

Not a single one of the heroines in the Unbroken Heroes series has been any kind of damsel. It’s true that they’ve each experienced more than their fair share of distress, but they’ve each participated 100% in their own rescues – often by rescuing themselves first. Halle doesn’t quite have that opportunity, but she keeps up with Ren through every step and stroke and kick of their dangerous escape, doing her part to make it deadly for the other guys and not for them.

No matter how kickass Halle turns out to be – and she does – the tension that lies at the heart of Ren’s bad case of “I’m not worthy” revolves around two very real problems. Ren is her dad’s best friend – and her dad is not going to be happy that someone at least a decade older than his daughter can’t keep his hands off of her. And there’s that decade or so itself. I adore an age gap romance because the problems involved are very real – and they are here as well.

It’s not that Halle isn’t an adult and doesn’t know her own mind or heart, it’s that they are at different points in their lives, have different-sized trains of emotional baggage behind them, and will need to reconcile those differences to have a decent chance at a future.

Of course, first they have to deal with the villains chasing them, otherwise they won’t have a future to worry about. And it’s that realization that gets Ren to finally acknowledge what’s been between them for so long.

I had a terrific time with this latest entry in the Unbroken Heroes series, and I have plenty to look forward to. The author’s next book will be a wrap-up novella in her Sentinel Security series, Stone. I’ve already read it and it was a terrific finale for that series! After that, it’ll be back to New Orleans for the Fury Brothers, which I’m very much looking forward to because I always enjoy books set in that fantastic city!

A- #BookReview: People in Glass Houses by Jayne Castle

A- #BookReview: People in Glass Houses by Jayne CastlePeople in Glass Houses (Ghost Hunters, #16) by Jayne Castle
Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via Edelweiss
Formats available: hardcover, ebook, audiobook
Genres: action adventure romance, futuristic, paranormal romance, romantic suspense, science fiction romance
Series: Harmony #16
Pages: 313
Published by Berkley on May 7, 2024
Purchasing Info: Author's WebsitePublisher's WebsiteAmazonBarnes & NobleKoboBookshop.orgBetter World Books
Goodreads

Dive into the alien world of Harmony in this new novel by New York Times bestselling author Jayne Castle.
His name is Joshua Knight. Once a respected explorer, the press now calls him the Tarnished Knight. He took the fall for a disaster in the Underworld that destroyed his career. The devastating event occurred in the newly discovered sector known as Glass House—a maze of crystal that is rumored to conceal powerful Alien antiquities. The rest of the Hollister Expedition team disappeared and are presumed dead.
Whatever happened down in the tunnels scrambled Josh’s psychic senses and his memories, but he’s determined to uncover the truth. Labeled delusional and paranoid, he retreats to an abandoned mansion in the desert, a house filled with mirrors. Now a recluse, Josh spends his days trying to discover the secrets in the looking glasses that cover the walls. He knows he is running out of time.
Talented, ambitious crystal artist Molly Griffin is shocked to learn that the Tarnished Knight has been located. She drops everything and heads for the mansion to find Josh, confident she can help him regain control of his shattered senses. She has no choice—he is the key to finding her sister, Leona, a member of the vanished expedition team. Josh reluctantly allows her to stay one night but there are two rules: she must not go down into the basement, and she must not uncover the mirrors that have been draped.
But her only hope for finding her sister is to break the rules…

My Review:

We all know the way that phrase ends, don’t we? “People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.” It’s a somewhat more potentially kinetic way of talking about the “pot calling the kettle black.” Or putting it yet another way, people who have the same faults should resist poking at each other along the same fault lines.

As it turns out, this particular story is also a case of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” – although Joshua Knight and Molly Griffin want to be much more than friends the moment they meet, in spite of both of them living in the glass house of having extremely high levels of paranormal talent that they keep under wraps.

Because too much power can be extremely dangerous – especially when all the power is encased in the fragile mind of a human. Any human.

Although at the moment they meet, both Joshua and Molly do happen to be rather fragile humans – particularly in the context of the not-totally-explored and still all too frequently dangerous lost Terran colony on Harmony. A planet where high-resonating crystal artifacts left on the planet by aliens have caused, raised and enhanced the psychic powers of the humans who have occupied the planet for more than two centuries.

Joshua Knight is considered to be psi-burned. He was a talented guide and navigator to Harmony’s fascinating but treacherous underworld, and he lost ALL the members of his last expedition.

An expedition that included Molly Griffin’s sister Leona. Molly needs Joshua to lead her to where he lost her sister. Joshua needs Molly to help him regain his lost memories of where he lost the expedition in order to have even a chance at making that happen.

Lucky for them, their talents dovetail in a harmony that neither of them ever expected. But not lucky at all for the mastermind who set Joshua up to take the fall and did not reckon, at all, on the dogged persistence of the Griffin sisters.

And not that the villain doesn’t have a plan B to take care of all of those new, pesky, loose ends that Molly and Joshua have managed to unravel in the crystal palaces hidden under Harmony.

Escape Rating A-: Once upon a time, a historical romance author writing under the name of Amanda Quick introduced an organization of physically adept practitioners and mad scientists into her Victorian Era set romances – and the Arcane Society was born. In one of her other personas, Jayne Ann Krentz, the author carried the Arcane Society in the 20th and 21st centuries. Under a third name, Jayne Castle, she created the lost Terran colony world of Harmony and eventually admitted that the original colonists included a considerable number of members of, you guessed it, the Arcane Society.

It’s been over two centuries since Harmony was cut off from Earth. The population has evolved to include paranormal talents, many of which have become specialized in response to the resonating crystal artifacts that aliens left behind on their new home world. Their society has also evolved into the close-knitted, family oriented, relatively stable structure that we see in this series.

The population also still throws out the occasional mad scientist.

Which is part of Molly and Leona Griffin’s background, although it’s not really part of this story – except in the trust issues that background left in both women – although the next book in the series will be going there – and I’m seriously looking forward to it.

But in the meantime, this book is focused in Harmony’s present, and follows directly after the events of Guild Boss while putting brand new characters in the literal hot seat – along with another of Harmony’s adorable, scene-stealing predators, Newton the intrepid dust bunny.

As is often the case in the entire extended Arcane Society/Harmony series, there’s both a crime to solve and a talented person to save from what seems like the brink of madness. Molly’s sister is missing, the search has been called off. Molly is determined to pursue the only lead she has left, the supposedly burned out has-been navigator, Joshua Knight.

Joshua is the one who needs saving – he’s pretty sure he’s going mad, and the crazy house he’s squatting in is helping to finish the job that the mess of that lost expedition merely started. Joshua and Molly are each other’s last chance, so they grab onto that chance – and each other – with both hands.

That they manage to find the lost expedition – as wonderful as that is – opens up an entirely new can of worms so that the chief worm can finally get squashed. Only to open the way for yet another and even more dangerous worm – or perhaps that should be wyrm – to emerge from the shadows.

The romance between Molly and Joshua is as hot as the energy they both channel, but the way that their mutual needs and insecurities keep bumping up against one another keeps the relationship from feeling like insta-love. They also have a lot more in common than just their tangling insecurities, leaving the reader to believe that they really do have a good chance at an HEA even after the adrenaline of this case evens out.

To make a long story – or review – short; Harmony is a fascinating world, the paranormal powers keep everything and everyone involved tuned up to the max, the dust bunnies are both adorable and deadly, the romances are scorching, and the tension of whatever wrong needs to be righted or case that needs to be solved has been keeping this reader on the edge of her seat from the very first and this entry in the series continues that happy trend. Visit Harmony and settle in for a long, highly charged, utterly captivating binge-read.

And, also very much to the good, the way that the resolution of this adventure hints so tantalizingly at the next gives this fan of the series a lot of high-rez hope for the next – which doesn’t appear to be coming nearly soon enough!