13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
4.5 Blue Ribbons from Romance Junkies, October 7, 2008
This review is from: No Escape (Mass Market Paperback)
Isabelle Carson refused to believe that so many of her friends have committed suicide. The survivor of a particularly seedy and foul foster home and vile foster father, Isabelle has strived to make something of herself and has done so. But so did her friends that have died. Knowing there is a connection and scared that she is next, Isabelle contacts the one man that saved her so long ago - Grant Kent. She knows calling him is a long shot but feels he needs to be warned. If her friends are dying, he could be next. She didn't count on Grant showing up on her doorstep willing to help her.
Grant Kent has never forgotten Isabelle Carson. Finally retired after many years in Delta Force, he is looking forward to his new occupation as a security consultant. Hearing a voice from so long ago asking him to be careful, Grant knows Isabelle is spooked and decides to pay her a visit, which in turn becomes so much more than just looking up an old friend.
Grant refuses to leave Isabelle, even if he is in danger, much to her dismay. If there is anything Grant is trained for, it is this dangerous situation. The feelings he has for Isabelle are new to him, but he is willing to see where their relationship leads.
As with her previous two books, Shannon K. Butcher treats readers to an outstanding romantic suspense. The mystery surrounding Isabelle, as well as the intriguing plot, gained my attention and never wavered. Add in steamy and romantic love scenes and I was unable to put NO ESCAPE down. Fast paced, suspenseful, and sensual - NO ESCAPE has it all and I, for one, am a die hard fan of this talented author.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
3.5 stars. Excellent romantic suspense but I had problems with the reasons for conflict between hero and heroine., October 23, 2008
This review is from: No Escape (Mass Market Paperback)
REVIEWER'S OPINION:
I love this author's writing style for romantic suspense. I would have given it 5 stars if the author would have used different reasons for separation and conflict between the hero and heroine. I describe these conflict methods under Spoilers below. Aside from that, the characters were neat. The story was good and well developed. The bad guy was cunning, scary and successful with his murders. He would spray his victims with a substance that caused immediate paralysis of all their muscles, but it only lasted for a matter of minutes, long enough for him to tie them up and do some things.
Warning for sensitive readers: the story includes a lot of death and violence.
STORY BRIEF:
Edgar Lavine was a foster parent to a group of kids. He sexually abused almost all of them. As a teen, Grant was assigned to the home. Shortly after arriving, Grant saw Edgar begin to rape Isabelle. Grant pulled Edgar off and killed him. Grant was taken by the police afterwards. Grant was in the military special forces for a number of years and recently left the military to start another job. Isabelle sent Christmas cards to Grant over the years. All of a sudden, some of the foster kids, now grown up, are dying. The police believe they are suicides. Isabelle believes they were murdered. She contacts Grant asking for his help.
CAUTION SPOILERS:
As soon as they become intimate, Isabelle wants to push Grant out of her life because she believes he is going to leave, and she doesn't want to be hurt by him later. She has only been around him for a couple of days, and she believes he doesn't want the kind of life she wants. She's not giving it a chance. Besides, in the end he did want that kind of life. Why stop a relationship before the couple has time to see if it might work? I didn't like her thinking.
Isabelle is a foster mother for Dale and is temporarily taking care of Rachel. Grant is getting along great with Dale and Rachel. Later in the story when they believe the bad guy is caught, Isabelle insists that Grant leave town. Her thoughts on page 382: "She knew sending him away now was the right thing to do. Better now than when they could no longer live without him - when everyone around her loved him as much as she did." Grant cared about the kids, was a good influence on them and was helping them. I think it's great to have a person like that in the kid's lives, even if Grant had to leave later. He could talk to them by phone and have a supportive long distance relationship with them. I recently heard someone say "children need all the love they can get from anywhere they can get it." This part of the story bothered me. If other readers don't mind this, they may find it an excellent book.
I loved what Grant did when he was sprayed with the paralyzing spray. As a sniper, he had practiced slowing his heartbeat before shooting. When he was sprayed, he concentrated on speeding up his heartbeat in hopes of metabolizing the spray faster than the murderer expected. I'm not giving away whether or not he was successful at it or what happened. I just hadn't thought of this idea before, so I label it as creative.
DATA:
Story length: 412 pages. Sexual language: moderate. Number of sex scenes: 3. Length of sex scenes: 7.1, 7.2 and 14.6 pages. Setting: current day Springfield, Missouri. Copyright: 2008. Genre: romantic suspense.
OTHER BOOKS:
For a list of my reviews of other Shannon K. Butcher books, see my 5 star review of "No Regrets" posted 10/13/08.
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9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
psychotic thriller, October 10, 2008
This review is from: No Escape (Mass Market Paperback)
I've enjoyed her first 2 books though some of the descriptions of violence/torture bothered me. Some romantic suspense is really too much for me. I wont' repeat on the theme but the reader knows who the killer is and knows it's a very close friend. He loves his friends and kills them believing he's saving them from the suffering of their childhoods because he himself is suffering from it.There are a lot of deaths in this book and violence. Even though that part only takes a page or so it has the person crying/begging and some he even has commit suicide with a threat to harm someone they love. This was hard for me to take and I know there are probably other 'wimps' like me who would appreciate a little warning. I did finish the book and think she did a much better job with the suspense but the romance part was overshadowed I felt like though the ending and epilogue were 'sweet'. Grant was my favorite guy from the 2 previous books and I looked forward to reading his story. I like how foster care and adoption were discussed somewhat and the concept of family. Overall a good read but know you're dealing with psycho stuff and someone very close killing his own friends.
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