ARC REVIEW The Third to Die by Allison Brennan

The first book in a new series by Alison Brennan, the Mobile Response Team is a new team not even fully formed yet that's lead by SAC Mathias Costa. Mathias is still trying to get his profiler and friends to not quit profiling and join the team and the cast that landed on his desk is just the one to do it, The Triple Killer. Kara Quinn is an undercover LAPD detective and due the the events of her last case she's on administrative leave. Her boss and friend recommended she get out of town, so she went home to Liberty Lake, Oregon. It turned out to not be quite the vacation she needed when she finds the body of a nurse by the lake the first victim of the Triple Killer.


Mathias and a few others go to Liberty Lake, the point of MRT is to help aid rural area PDs that aren't otherwise capable of handling situations like this. Ever three years this killer strikes they haven't yet determined victimology but it's the same way all three time and every crime scene is clean not evidence and what they have found isn't in the system. Mathias is determined to catch the guy this time. Kara having several good friends on the local PD force and being the one who found the first victim has a few idea she' not afraid to share. Mathias' initially thought she's could be trouble or she could be helpful and she is a little bit of both. Kara gives some helpful insight and the profiler digs deep enough to discover just who this person is and why he's killing. But, will they be able to stop him before he kills again?

This is mostly a mystery/thriller but there is a romantic element between Kara and Mathias. It's not a full on romance as there is no HEA. Like with the Lucy Kincaid series, I believe, the ongoing story of Mathias and Kara romance will go through the series. Overall, this was a great read. I enjoy Allison Brennan but I haven't read one of her books since before Luck Kincaid got her own series. I loved the flawed characters, Kara has a lot going on for her with her upbringing and her current career path. Their profiler Dr. Catherine Jones lost her sister to a serial killer recently and had a crisis of faith in her job. Mathias, well not much is said about him yet but I'm hopeful and Brennan doesn't disappoint. This was a fantastic first for the new series and I'm already looking forward to the next to see where she lead the MRT next.

ARC REVIEW Her Last Word by Mary Burton

Her Last Word is a standalone romantic suspense and psychological thriller. Different from Burton’s other Romantic Suspense Her Last Word follows a slightly different formula. You have the main present day storyline interceded with short “Interview Files” that fills in the blanks further on what happened fourteen years ago. I loved how she did this, the interview files at times has a foreshadowing quality sometimes not as ominous just a clue as to who they will be talking to next and what their part was in the original case. This is more suspense/thriller than romance, it’s not until close to the end that the main characters get together, which I also liked because they spend most of the time focusing on the case and not their feelings for one another. The sexual chemistry does exist it’s quite amusing how many times someone else mentions the obvious attraction between them and when they finally do give in it’s pretty hot.

Gina Mason was a girl everyone liked until one night she disappeared. The only witness to the kidnapping was her younger cousin, Kaitlin Roe. Fourteen years later Gina still hasn’t been found and Kaitlin has returned to bring this cold case back to life. Kaitlin plans to do a podcast and bring focus back to Gina and see if maybe after all these years someone, somewhere has a clue to what happened. But soon after Kaitlin starts one of Gina’s best friends is murdered and Detective John Adler doesn’t think it’s a coincidence. Kaitlin not going to stop digging into her cousin’s disappearance even if it puts her into the cross hairs of a killer. Adler is determined to solve both cases and keep Kaitlin safe.

Overall, it’s an outstanding story. The characters are well written, aside from Kaitlin and Adler who are fantastic characters, Logan and Quinn were a nice addition to the story. Quinn’s unfavorable look on Kaitlin was a nice contrast to Adler’s unwavering belief in Kaitlin. Kaitlin and Adler are similar in their tenacity and while Adler may want to protect her he doesn’t treat Kaitlin like she’s inept. Kaitlin is no damsel in distress she is perfectly capable to handle herself and she doesn’t run off doing stupid things without thinking it through, after what happened to Gina she’s paranoid. All in all I loved this book.   

My review can also be found here: Ramblings From This Chick

ARC REVIEW Dangerous in Charge by Sidney Bristol

Aegis Group Alpha Team #5, Team Leader Kyle Martin finally gets his HEA. I can not tell you how much I enjoy it when Sidney Bristol writes serial killers. You are guaranteed a thrill ride, her active setting just brings everything to life, the action scenes are intense, the romance hot, and the bad guy is evil to last drop. Kyle Martin and Bethany Rossi have known each other for a year in a strictly professional manner, Bethany was his father's caregiver and for her to last that long with his verbally and sometime physically abusive father showed Kyle just how strong a person she is and Bethany almost quit  right of the back but she saw how Kyle was going through the same crap she just went through and she figured in her mind no matter how bad it got Kyle wouldn't abandon his father and she couldn't let him go through all that alone so she stayed. They formed their own friendship that centered around Kyle's father but now that his Dad is dead there is no real reason for them to see each other anymore.

Beth has a few things in common with her roommates, one they are all in the medical profession and two they have all cut themselves from their family for reasons of their own. Bethany cut herself off from her family when they picked her abusive fiance over her. After some really bad dates Bethany decided to not date for a year, to get to know who she is and what she really wants out of a relationship, she's half way through that year when Kyle's Dad dies. Megan, one of Bethany's roommates, goes missing and the only person she can think to ask for help is Kyle; from what his father told her about his job she knows he finds people. The police said it's to early but she knows something is wrong, Kyle who is on bereavement leave and is looking for something to keep him busy and keep his mind off of his dad and because it's Beth asking he readily agrees to help. After tracking down Megan's parents they discover that Megan has been more than likely kidnapped by a serial killer who has been active for the last thirty years and never caught, never even come close to catching. Not just that but this particular killer hunts in groups of three and Bethany and her other roommate Faith are targets too.

Kyle and Bethany get pretty hot and heavy but neither of them think they are in a good place to start a relationship. Bethany still has six months on her self imposed no dating year and Kyle thinks he's to broken for her. With the Triple Threat Killer still on the loose emotions are running hot and tempers are flaring and things just keep getting worse and worse for Bethany and her roommates. Overall, this was an outstanding read. The emotional rollercoaster between Kyle and Beth gets little tiresome at the end and she does something stupid but with how screwed up everything was at that point she wasn't thinking straight and it worked with the story, but I still had that knee jerk reaction of, "really, you going to be that stupid?" other than that I loved the book and it had a great ending.