Review: Through the Fire by Katie Ruggle

Through the Fire (Rocky MountainK9 Unit #4) by Katie Ruggle
Publication date: August 28th 2018
Publisher: Sourcebooks Casablanca
My rating:  3.5 Stars
Pages: 416
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He's tall.
He's dark.
He's brutally handsome...
And he may be her only hope.

Kit Jernigan despairs of ever fitting in with her new tight-knit K9 unit—they've been through too much to welcome a stranger. So when a killer strikes, it's a fight to convince her fellow officers to trust her long enough to catch the woman she knows is responsible.

She can't do it on her own. What she needs most is a partner: local fire spotter Wesley March.

Wes knows in his heart that Kit is right, and he's willing to leave his lonely tower to help her prove it. But the more time they spend together, the hotter the fire smolders...and the more danger they're in. A member of the K9 unit's inner circle is determined to have her revenge—no matter who gets burned in the process.

This time, it's personal.

My Thoughts:

Kit has moved up to Monroe, Colorado to get away from a bad situation in her previous job as an officer with K9 companion.  But Kit doesn’t realize the drama that’s gone on in Monroe since she’s applied for and accepted her position.  It’s obvious when she first starts that it’ll be a while before her fellow officers accept and trust her, and this is a bit discouraging to Kit. They all seem to love her bloodhound Justice, though.  Then there’s Elena, also a new arrival who sets off all kinds of alarms.  Her damsel-in-distress act doesn’t fool Kit one bit, but just about everyone else including her fellow officers seems to buy her act. Despite some of these obstacles Kit is determined to work hard and gain trust. Plus, there’s Wes a gorgeous, but awkward forest ranger, as she’s arrived in to town doesn’t hurt. 

Really liked Kit and Wes.  The way she just got Wes and found him to be so utterly attractive even with his awkward social interactions.  Wes was immediately attracted to Kit and was over the moon that she didn’t seem repelled by his lack of social skills.  She seemed to understand and accommodate the fact he got overwhelmed in a group.  AND (!) he didn’t fall prey to Elena’s helpless girl act was a huge positive in my book!

Loved the relationship Kit had with her adorable bloodhound K9 tracker partner, Justice, and that she was willing to help Sam with his training of Fifi, another bloodhound.

I’ve really enjoyed Katie Ruggle’s romantic suspense stories, and her Rocky Mountain K9 Unit has been filled with thrills and danger! I had fun with Through the Fire, but I wasn’t pleased that Kit’s concerns over Elena were ignored or brushed aside. It seemed unbelievable in a few instances. Didn’t like that it took so long for the guys to believe Kit after enough red flags pointed Elena’s direction. Just the fact that Sam didn’t like her should’ve registered with Jules and the gang!  Still, the fact that I loved the awkward and sweet romance between Kit and Wes made up for the disappointment.

 

Review: Pieces of Her by Karin Slaughter

Pieces of Her by Karen Slaughter
Publication date: August 21st 2018
Publisher: William Morrow
My rating:  4 Stars
Pages: 480
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What if the person you thought you knew best turns out to be someone you never knew at all . . . ?

Andrea knows everything about her mother, Laura. She knows she’s spent her whole life in the small beachside town of Belle Isle; she knows she’s never wanted anything more than to live a quiet life as a pillar of the community; she knows she’s never kept a secret in her life. Because we all know our mothers, don’t we?

But all that changes when a trip to the mall explodes into violence and Andrea suddenly sees a completely different side to Laura. Because it turns out that before Laura was Laura, she was someone completely different. For nearly thirty years she’s been hiding from her previous identity, lying low in the hope that no one would ever find her. But now she’s been exposed, and nothing will ever be the same again.

The police want answers and Laura’s innocence is on the line, but she won’t speak to anyone, including her own daughter. Andrea is on a desperate journey following the breadcrumb trail of her mother’s past. And if she can’t uncover the secrets hidden there, there may be no future for either one of them. . . .

My Thoughts:

Andrea, just turning thirty-one has been living a kind of pathetic, stagnant life, but things get very interesting on her birthday lunch! Out with her mother, Laura, they’re caught up in a dangerous situation and the predictable, reliable mother she thought she knew turns into a cool-as-a-cucumber woman handling the deadly situation like she’s a trained professional.  

The details of the situation are splashed all over the media, and with the public attention details of Andrea’s mother begin to surface.  Soon it becomes clear that they’re both in extreme danger.  Andrea’s forced on the run trying to reconcile the past of her mother she thought she knew with the reality that she’s now piecing together. 

Mystery, deception, and danger make Pieces of Her a riveting read!  The story flips back and forth from Laura’s past to Andrea’s present, slowly revealing why Andrea and Laura are in such danger now. I have to say my first impression of Andrea was not great, in fact I really wanted to shake her a time or two!  But she stepped up her game when the pressure cranked up!  Andrea still had a couple of bouts of stupidity here and there, but I can’t say I’d do any better in the situation with the lack of sleep.  I really liked Andrea by the end.

Some of Laura’s life choices in the past were shocking, and I had mixed feelings about her, but Karin Slaughter has a way of making you empathize with her characters even when they’re life decisions are morally questionable or downright wrong.

I love Karin Slaughter’s addictive brand of story-telling!  She writes imperfect characters that you can relate to even when their lives are so far out of your normal perspective. I LOVE her Will Trent series to death, but her stand-alones, like The Good Daughter and now Pieces of Her are impressive!  I read all 480 pages within a 24-hour period because it was hard to put down!

 

Review: Aftermath by Kelley Armstrong

Aftermath by Kelley Armstrong
Publication date: May 22nd 2018
Publisher: Crown Books for Young Readers
My rating:  3 Stars
Pages: 384
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Three years after losing her brother Luka in a school shooting, Skye Gilchrist is moving home. But there's no sympathy for Skye and her family because Luka wasn't a victim; he was a shooter.

Jesse Mandal knows all too well that the scars of the past don't heal easily. The shooting cost Jesse his brother and his best friend--Skye.

Ripped apart by tragedy, Jesse and Skye can't resist reopening the mysteries of their past. But old wounds hide darker secrets. And the closer Skye and Jesse get to the truth of what happened that day, the closer they get to a new killer. 

My Thoughts:

Aftermath is a story that’s relevant to current times.  Living in the States, school shootings are sadly becoming more and more frequent. I’ve often thought of the family of the shooter, how they’re affected when one of their own commits such a horrible crime.  Often the family is shocked, blindsided and branded as villains as well.

Aftermath is a fictional story centering on Skylar, the sister of one of the school shooters of a shooting that took place three years ago.  My heart went out to her.  The brother she knew would never have done what Luka did, and with him gone she’s been left to bear the brunt of hate aimed his way.  More now than ever when she’s forced to return to her hometown where the shooting took place.  Skylar expects hostility, but not the sinister pranks, bullying and phone calls she experiences.  Is someone trying to punish her for her brother’s crimes or question his guilt?

I’ve enjoyed Kelley Armstrong’s writing for quite some time, lately with her Casey Duncan series.  Love that series!  While I liked Aftermath, I can’t say it wowed me.  Skylar was a likable and sympathetic character and I liked Jesse as well, but their romance was a bit underwhelming.  It was sort of a second chance romance and they both had gone through so much, so of course I wanted them to be together, there just wasn’t really any spark to it, IMO. Kelley Armstrong usually has me on the edge of my seat with suspense, and there were a couple of tension filled moments in this story, but I think the danger was downplayed by the characters when the panic button should’ve been pushed!  They didn’t feel the urgency (stupidly, IMO) and so I think the story didn’t feel as suspenseful.  Maybe this was because the story is Young Adult?  I don’t know.  Still, I was entertained, and felt the need to push on and find out what exactly was going on.