Customer Reviews

No Escape

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

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.

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.

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.

Elementary school teacher and foster mother Isabelle Carson has discovered that three of her former foster brothers and sisters have died of apparent suicides. Isabelle is certain they were murdered but no one is listening to her. Then former Delta Force veteran Grant Kent comes back into her life. Grant also lived in the same foster home as the other victims, and after he listens to what Isabelle has found, he thinks there are just too many coincidences.

Grant is determined to help Isabelle find out what is going on and to keep her safe. Isabelle is so relieved that someone believes her. But neither Isabelle nor Grant expected to find passion and possibly love in each other. Can they stop the killer before they are next on the killer's list?

Shannon K. Butcher is quickly finding a place on my "automatic buy" list. She has written three wonderful suspense-filled romance stories that link to one another by virtue of the main characters knowing the other main characters, although each story is also standalone. She is not afraid to tackle difficult subjects either and handle them very well.

In No Escape, both Isabelle and Grant are potential targets of a serial killer because they once lived in an abusive foster home. The killer is a very sick person, and it is hard for a normal person to fathom the reasoning behind the murders-so Isabelle and Grant find it very difficult to figure out who is targeting them. This criminal is a mastermind at providing misdirection and setting up red herrings to keep the police as well as Isabelle and Grant off balance.

This is a difficult book to put down and walk away from because you will find yourself thinking about story; the plot is so intricate and intriguing. If you have never read a book by Shannon Butcher and love action-filled and highly suspenseful romances, then this is a book you will enjoy.

I hope another book is in the works because I can't wait to see what she will do next!

Armchair Interviews says: Super read.

This is the third in the series about Delta Force operatives, following No Regrets and No Control. They're connected books, but they stand alone, so there's no problem with reading out of order. I'd highly recommend reading all of them, though--they're excellent.

Elementary school teacher Isabelle Carson grew up in foster homes. Three of her former foster-siblings have died--suicides, according to the police, but Isabelle thinks that's too many for coincidence. And she knew them--they weren't suicidal.

Worried, she contacts the others who were in the home with them, including Grant Kent, who'd saved her from their abusive foster father years ago.

Grant, a Delta Force vet, has a couple of days before starting his new job with his friend David's (from No Regrets) security company, so he decides to visit Isabelle to see what her message was all about... and because he hasn't been able to get her out of his mind. He figured he'd take a couple of hours, straighten things out for her, and be on his way.

Instead, he finds Isabelle and himself, and the rest of their former foster-siblings the targets of a ruthless killer, and he can't leave.

He also can't stay. Isabelle is realizing her dream of being a foster parent herself, and Grant knows he's not father material. But the longer he stays, the harder it is to resist Isabelle, and the closer he gets to Isabelle's foster son Dale.

No Escape puts the "suspense" in "romantic suspense." The chilling prologue sets the stage, and the pace and suspense don't let up until the end of the last chapter. (The epilogue does let you catch your breath, thank goodness--you'll need it.)

We do find out whodunit midway through the book, but that just adds to the suspense. These characters just do not get a break. They're tested physically, emotionally, and professionally: they're in physical danger, Grant's in danger of losing his job, they're both in danger of having their hearts broken, Isabelle is frightened for her friends and her foster son, and Grant has to deal with feelings of being an outsider.

Through all these intensely emotional crises, you get to know Grant and Isabelle, and watch them fall in love. It's vivid and believable. They're such complex characters, and they're fighting their attraction because they don't think there's a future in their relationships (Isabelle had experience with a fiance who left because he didn't want to be a foster parent, so her worry--and her taking Grant at his word that he wasn't cut out to be a father--was understandable). But underneath it, you can tell how much they care for each other.

I loved Isabelle--she's triumphed over a difficult childhood and is now dedicated to helping other children. And I loved Grant--from a similar background, yet he's dealt with it differently. Typically male, he's found his self-worth in what he does, and first in Delta Force, and now in his friend's security company, that's in protecting people. Yet he still has trouble accepting and trusting himself. It was wonderful seeing him heal through the course of the book.

And I absolutely loved the plot. This wasn't a straightforward whodunit, just a simple matter of finding clues and catching the killer. Every time you think it's all going to be fine, there's another crisis or twist, and putting the book down becomes impossible.

All the elements just came together perfectly. The action/suspense parts got my adrenaline up, the emotional parts put a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes, and the romance made my heart go pitty-pat. And those steamy scenes, well... They fit the book and were nicely steamy.

*sigh* I was hoping I'd gotten better at writing about books I love, but apparently they still reduce me to babbling.

Fabulous book. I wholeheartedly recommend it.

No Escape by Shannon K. Butcher

Grant Kent out of the blue receives a call from a woman he has not seen in fourteen years. Panic in her voice makes him nervous, so he drives to Springfield Missouri, a place he said he would never return to after his horrible past. Killing a man didn't exactly put you in everyone's good-graces, even if the man was a pedophile, child rapist, and a foster father. Grant saved Isabelle Carson, but he couldn't save those that were already molested. A dark past better left in the dark, but one bright shining moment he'll never forget is the day he met Isabelle.

Isabelle Carson knows that people are being murdered, they're not simply committing suicide like the police and papers are saying. Someone is killing her friends, people she knew from foster care. Does it seem at all coincidental that these recent "suicides" were all residents of the same foster family she was from fourteen years ago? It would seem that Edgar Lavine is killing from the underworld, but with not much evidence it is hard to prove a murderer is on the loose and out for revenge.

Isabelle has always had feelings for Grant, and Grant for Isabelle. Time and distance will make the heart grow fonder, and an explosion of drama and danger will bring these two star characters together in an unforgettable way. Isabelle has grown up to be a lovely woman, Grant has spent his stint in the military now he's a security consultant. When Dale, Isabelle's foster son is taken by his newly paroled father, all hell is about to break loose. While Isabelle tries not to be killed, by accident, poison, or by someone she trusts, Grant is trying to prove his innocence and find out who is killing these people and trying to get Dale back before something horrible happens to him. A flurry of unfathomable events is about to take place, come along for the ride?

Shannon K. Butcher is a brand new author for me, but I very much enjoyed her work. Exquisite detailing, believable characters, and love so true and pure it could overcome any boundary, Ms. Butcher is simply bewitching. 4 Hearts

Hachette Book Group
ISBN# 0446510289

Everyone around Isabelle Carson are dying. The police aren't concerned because to them these people took their own lives. Isabelle does not want to consider that could be possible especially when two of the people were Isabelle closest friends. Isabelle knows they won't kill themselves when they have little kids around. Isabelle calls Grant to warn him. When Grant receives Isabelle message he comes running right away to protect Isabelle but Grant might be the one that needs protecting from Isabelle. The longer Grant is around Isabelle the faster he is falling in love with her again.

When you think of Grant Kent, there is only one word to describe him...H-O-T. Grant Kent is what heroes are made of. He is tall, dark and deadly but has a heart of a lover. Right away No Escape gets your heart racing a hundred miles a minute with no end in sight. Shannon K. Butcher throws all the punches and holds nothing back. No Escape is moving at a rapid pace and if you don't watch out No Escape will blow you away. I had no clue who was the villain in this book. The ending did not let me down. I will definitely read more by Ms Butcher.

This book is meant for sick minds. Why would anybody write about children being raped, horrendous murders and try to pass it off as a romantic thriller? I would not reccomend this to anyone!

'No Escape' is the last book in Butcher's Delta Force Series., and while I have enjoyed each one of them, 'No Regret' the first in the series is hands down my favorite. 'No Escape' definitely left me wanting more, and I really disliked that Butcher decided to tell the reader pretty early on who the villian was. I personally like to be guessing the "who-dunit" part of the book until the last few pages, as it keeps my head more in the story and leaves me wanting to read more. There are no bells and whistles with this series or this book in particular, there just a good easy read.

Loved this book. Loved the story & the character developement. Shannon is as good an author as her husband & he's one of my favorites!!! Looking forward to more of these books - love the way she has weaved all the characters together & yet distinct in their own way. When is another book coming out??