Customer Reviews

I'll Be Watching You

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Set in the murky swamps of the Florida Everglades where alligators swim thick and loyalties run deep, comes a chilling tale of family secrets and a town where people will stop at nothing to protect their own.

Kim Lyons inherits Southern Comfort from her grandma Elva. Now is Kim's chance to own a bar, except the good folks of Cypress don't want her sticking around. Ten year ago she had accused one of its prominent citizens of murder. Threats turn serious when Kim starts digging into Elva's death. Was it an accident like the townspeople claimed happened to the last victim ten years earlier? Or is something more sinister going on?

Zell Macgregor isn't supposed to protect Kim after she accused his father of murder. He's not supposed to like her, either, but he does. Torn between his loyalties to his family and guilt over lying on the witness stand to protect his father, Zell wishes Kim would just leave things be and go back to her big city home. He doesn't want to see her hurt or worse. The longer she's in town, the more he wants to act on his attraction to her, which will cause all kinds of trouble.

Ms. Wainscott has mixed a suspenseful and interesting plot with great characterization. Zell was so adorable I couldn't help falling in love with him, and I admired Kim's strength and courage. Oscar the pig stole my heart also! I'LL BE WATCHING YOU is such a great book! Don't miss it!

Ten years ago, Kim's widowed mother remarried, and it was an unthinkable marriage in Kim's eyes, to the man she believed had killed her father. She left Florida and the pain behind, but when her grandmother dies in another mysterious "accident", Kim is left with her inheritance and a pack of questions.

When she heads south to claim the bar and home left to her, Kim is faced with old resentments and memories. The easy way out would be to sell out and go home, but Kim is not one to take the easy way. Despite hostility and being forced into repeated confrontations with her childhood tormenter, Zell, she hangs tough. Every day brings her closer to finding out the truth that cost her grandmother her life. Her stubbornness and passion could exact the same toll from Kim, unless Zell makes an impossible choice.

**** The pages of I'll Be Watching you sizzle with sulty passion and crackle with sharply ironic humor. Facing one's past is never easy, and always necessary. The author's use of psychological metaphor is subtle and effective in creating a well rounded plot. ***** Amanda Killgore

I picked this up not knowing anything about it, only that it was written by Ms. Wainscott. I was not disappointed. The story was really great and I loved how Kim, even with the blows her life threw her, she did not give up on her dream of owning her own bar. Ms. Wainscott described the characters to the point where it left no voids. I could really feel for Kim and found my eyes tearing up from the fact that she was so strong and relentless. The killer took me totally by surprise, which is what I love about a good suspense novel.

This was truly a great book. It kept me wondering until the very end. Very exciting. Loved the way the author slowly developed the relationship between Kim and Zell and how she ended them as a couple. I also enjoyed the way she portrayed Kim's character as a strong, brave female who was determined not to flee Cypress because of some sick people who couldn't let the past go. She stuck it out and won them over. Hard to put down!!!

This was another very interesting and entertaining suspense novel by Ms. Wainscott. There were so many twists and turns and so many possible bad guys that you will be kept guessing until the very last chapter as to who is the bad guy!

Kim left behind a lot when she left her childhood home under the stressful circumstance of having accused the son of a prominent local family of murder. 10 years later she returns to Cypress after the death of her grandmother. What she finds is that things really haven't changed in the small everglades town and that memories are long when it comes to holding a grudge. Someone whats her gone and will go to great extremes to make sure she gets the message. Problem is Kim's tougher then she looks and she plans on staying.

Zell wants to dislike Kim but she is a strong individual that speaks to him in more ways then one. He is finding himself wanting to stick up for her even though it goes against the family. When things start happening to Kim he finds that he wants to help her and is afraid that the people that are messing with her are his family. Things are easy to ignore until someone tries to kill her. Now he can't turn and look the other way and further more, he doesn't want too. Problem is can they find out who wants to hurt Kim before they finally succeed?

This was a fast paced story that will keep you tied to the book until the final page! The chemistry between Zell and Kim is as hot as the Florida Everglades! This was a great book and Ms. Wainscott is now an author I will pick up based on her name alone. For a great suspense you can't beat on penned by Ms. Wainscott!

Kim Lyons has been dreaming of owning her own bar. Her dream finally comes true, though not exactly in the way she imagined, when she inherits her grandmother's bar, Southern Comfort. It's a dream and a nightmare all wrapped up into one, as it means going back to Cypress, the small town she thought she left behind ten years ago.

The town doesn't exactly welcome her with open arms. Quite the opposite in fact: the town has a long memory, and hasn't forgiven Kim for accusing one of its prominent members of murder ten years ago. A man who was once her stepfather.

As Kim works to keep the bar open, it's clear someone doesn't want her to stay: threats are made, the bar is vandalized, and she's even attacked. A lesser woman would have given up, sell the bar, and flee town. Kim digs in her heels and chooses to honor her grandmother's memory and fight for the bar and home her grandmother loved so much. As she stays and digs into her grandmother's records, she realizes that things aren't as they seem and her grandmother's accidental death may not have been an accident at all. The more Kim digs, the more danger her life is in. Who is responsible for her grandmother's death, and who can she trust?

Zell MacGregor isn't supposed to protect Kim. he isn't even supposed to like her. After all, it was his father she accused of murder. But he's torn between loyalty to his family, guilt over lying on the stand ten years ago to protect his father, and a growing admiration for Kim. As the threats against Kim escalate into an attempt on her life, Zell must decide whether or not to give in to his attraction and need to protect Kim, even if it means incurring his family's wrath.

This was my first book by Tina Wainscott and it won't be my last. It's been quite some time since I've enjoyed a book so thoroughly. I was wrapped up in the mystery from the first word to the last. She kept me guessing throughout, and when the identity of the killer was finally revealed,...boy, I didn't see that one coming!

Ms. Wainscott painted the setting so vividly, I could smell the bug spray and feel the mosquitoes pierce my skin. I was in the Everglades right next to Kim. Kim was a strong, admirable heroine who never gave up despite the many obstacles thrown in her way. I didn't want this one to end.

I loved this book. It was well written, intriguing, suspenseful, interesting and suprising. I did have an idea of who did it a little more than half way through, but I had to put all the pieces together to come to that conclusion and it was still a fantastic read. I could not put it down and for once, the romance didn't seem forced as it does in a lot of books. Everything in this book is believable and I will now search out her books just to read another great book like this one.

WOW! This was the first book I have read by Tina Wainscott and will not be my last. I found the story chilling and didn't see the end coming up until the very end. I fell in love with both Kim and Zell and would love to read more about them. Wish there had been another chapter or two, but great none-the-less!

I'll be Watching You isn't the best book ever written but it will adequately pass the time. It certainly keeps you guessing as to who is the murderer of the main character Kim's grandmother, a person who is also watching her every move. Where it isn't that great is that it is a bit unrealistic, I mean a couple of dimwitted thugs who have just got out of jail for a violent attack on a woman, come on as soon as they commit a crmie there would be a long line of people passing on info to the police/parol office to see them removed from their society and back in jail. No matter how much you don't respect the new victim your concern for your own female friends and family would outweigh this and you'd jump at the chance to put these people back behind bars.

Kim also, although a courageous character, isn't always the brightest. You've also the stepbrother/stepsister wanting to sleep with each other factor which is a bit creepy, even if his original family doesn't like her and equally she has also kept her grudge against them. Maybe the author was watching the Bold and the Beautiful or something in between writing sessions. The storyline certainly didn't need a romance element to work, it has enough in its own plot to keep readers turning the pages.

It is a good storyline, full of action, ecentric Florida characters and even a bit of supernatural factor with a child who dreams visions of the future. I certainly would recommend it but would have rated it higher without the brother sister romance angle.

Basic plot Kim an unhappy city barworker recieves a phone call telling her that her grandmother had passed away. Her grandmother is the only family she has any appreciation and respect for, although she hasn't bothered to visit her. She returns to the rural Floridian town of her childhood to check out her inheritance (grandma left her house and bar) and discovers she has also inherited some valuable orchards and a pig. These things do complicate a quick disposable of assets, as does her determination to make sure her grandmother's life is honoured in who she disposes the bar to. The town however has not forgiven the fact that she accused her stepfather of murder and they aren't shy about letting her know it. She hasn't forgiven him or ever accepted his and the rest of his and her family's story that he didn't do it either. Throw in the fact that by going through her grandmother's stuff she suspects there had some shady dealings going on and her grandmother was likely murdered and she isn't leaving town until she's got to the bottom of it all. Plus aside for the locals she's actually getting to like owning her own bar.

Ten years after accusing her prominent step-father of murder, Kim returns to her hometown to take ownership of a bar willed to her by her recently deceased grandmother. As she sets about trying to renovate and reopen, it is clear that at least some of the residents would rather she vacate the bar and Florida swamp town permanently, particularly when she starts probing the suspicious death of her grandmother Elva.

One thing stands between her and the angry townspeople - estranged stepbrother Zell MacGregor who has always been attracted to Kim. As he fights his attraction and tries to honor his family loyalty, Zell and Kim fall into a very reluctant romance, as an unknown adversary lurks in the background trying to ensure that the swamp secrets remain a mystery.

Wainscott carves out a compelling romantic mystery giving new meaning to the adage that you can't return home.