REVIEW Penumbra by Keri Arthur

Penumbra: Book Three in the Spook Squad. I would be so happy if their was more of these in the future. As always it is action packed with plenty of stuff going on. The ending was satisfying but leaves you wanting more.  Sam Ryan and Gabriel Stern are back and this time no longer partners. Sam reassigned to guard the clone government minister Dan Wetherton. Gabriel happy about having Sam reassigned but pissed that she was put on protection duty of a man who will put her in direct line of the people who want her. Sam has been having dreams filling in the blanks on her past and the man who is the missing link between her future potential and her past. Gabe is working trying to find out  who has been killing more people and protecting Sam at the same time. Sam has had enough with hiding and is putting herself in plain site daring the scientist to come and get her. Sam still thinking Gabe wants nothing to do with her is trying to move past her feelings but things keep happening showing her just what Gabe wants. The ominous Joe Black keeps inserting himself in Sam's life and more Sam learns about her past the more questions it raises. Just who is Dan Wetherton? Who is Joe Black? Who keeps killing people associated with the failed and closed down experiment called Penumbra?

Gabe and Sam finally work together to make sure that Penumbra stays closed and with Sam's past fully recovered and her powers fully back as well can mean so much more than anyone ever thought.


  

Review Reprise:  the first two Books in the Spook Squad series previously posted on my old blog.

Memory Zero: by Keri Arthur book one in the Spook Squad series originally published ten years ago. A futuristic, scif-fi, paranormal, mystery, urban fantasy really everything I love in one book. A well written story by Keri Arthur, I have seen her books around but never had the opportunity to read on until now and I'm glad I read this one. Sam is my favorite kind of character she is strong, snarky, doesn't know her own beauty and when the shit hits the fan she does what she does best and improvises. The story is an enigma wrapped in a mystery when one thing leads you down one path you end up somewhere completely different. Sam loves her job but when her partner goes missing her life turns upside down. Two week after his disappearance he calls her up to meet but what she finds is a man who says he is but isn't her partner and a strange monster that's starts to hunt her and a strange, large, handsome man who saves her. To make matters worse the not partner is a vampire bend on turning her she has no choice but to kill him before he kills her. Now because nobody believes that he was a vampire and his wife spilling lies about them having an affair she is suspended from duty. The spook squad has had their eye on her for some time so they bring her in for an "evaluation" but really they are testing her abilities and how it is she can do that groovy thing she does so well. Sam's life began at age fourteen nothing before then existed not even her memory. Gabriel Stern, the mysterious handsome large man who saved her from the flying monster is the one of the top men of the Special Investigations Unit, the "Spook Squad" , and he is determined to find out why Sam is different why she can tell the difference between the paranormal species and why the criminal mastermind is out for her. Gabriel is trying to protect Sam from those who want her but she just keeps going off on her own trying to solve what happened to her partner and her past slowly starts to reveal itself. It is revealed about just what Sam is but her past is still a mystery. Even after they thwarted the criminal mastermind and Sam's evil ex-partner Sam's still suspended and transferred permanently transferred to the spook squad and partnered with Gabriel. To be Continued in Generation 18.


Generation 18: by Keri Arthur A beautiful new cover for the re-release of Generation 18, book two of Keri Arthur's Spook Squad series. It picks up a little bit after the conclusion of Memory Zero where Gabriel and Sam have been partners for enough time to drive each other crazy. Gabriel pushing Sam away and keeping her at the office doing paper work and research trying to get her mad enough to ask for a transfer. The start up of a serial killer and kite monster attacks draws Sam out of the office and in to the playing field and into the line of fire. Gabriel is pushing her away because he has lost two partners in the past and he likes Sam way to much to risk losing her, but he has played the bastard to many times and risks losing her as more than just a partner. The evidence leads Sam and Gabriel to the Medical Military base knows as Hopewell. Hopewell has continually had medical experiments in the past and there are ties that might lead Sam to finding out her past. She has been having dreams about a boy named Joshua and is able to talk to the mysterious "Joe Black", the hobo looking hairy guy who helped her in the past, in dreams and he points her in the right direction for her own past and the rejects from Hopewell. The growing connection between Gabe and Sam is growing stronger, Gabe knows this and uses it to his advantage but only when Gabe is in trouble does Sam face that fact and use it to help find Gabe when he is kidnapped by the rejects. Sam whose body has been stunted at the age of sixteen has just started changing and has had her first period she is also experiencing newer and stronger powers. I really have been torturing myself with this series I have had all three books and I have been waiting until closer to review to read each one, at least it is only a months wait between each books. I am really enjoying this series with the yo-yoing between Sam and Gabe relationship and Sam always getting beat down and getting right back up to help and save the day. These are really enjoyable reads I can't wait to dig my claws in to Penumbra, which comes out next month.