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43 of 45 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Thrilling, intricate tale of suspense, July 29, 2008
This review is from: Triple Exposure (Mass Market Paperback)
Rachel Copeland returns to her home in Marfa, Texas, thinking to find safety and refuge from her past. Serenity is the last thing Rachel finds as danger lurks in every corner: in the landscape, in her family, from the loner Zeke and from someone who means her harm. Unearthly lights, known as the Marfa lights, and ghostly owls haunt the desert landscape with an inexplicable mystery. The Marfa spirit guides have a way of uncovering even the darkest secrets. Rachel Copeland's stalker won't ever let her forget that she killed a man. The courts may have let her go saying it was self-defense but no one can seem to forget, not even Rachel herself. Her defense has wrecked havoc on the life and finances of her father and step-mother. Doubt lingers. Hostilities and resentments tinge personal interactions. While in her step-mother's diner, Rachel meets a loner, a man who also shuns attention, a man no one really knows. As she photographs his woodworking, she captures on film what her heart sees --- Zeke Pike, a man ever so sensuous and talented. Rachel's camera gets her in a load of trouble as her photography peels away the layers, opening up secrets and raw emotions. When Rachel's photographs become part of a committee's program to promote local artists, the beauty of Zeke's body and art stand before her in print and in her heart in a way she can no longer ignore. Just as her heart opens, the public exposure stirs up past and current trouble. Suddenly, danger threatens both love and life --- but who is behind all the threats? A startling, eye-opening, edge-of-the-seat twist draws Zeke and Rachel together like never before.
Colleen Thompson writes a thrilling, intricate tale of suspense that reaches deep into the darkness and secrets of the human heart. Carefully chosen citations at the beginning of each chapter create a mysterious atmosphere with images of the Marfa lights and indeed light itself. Eerie passages on owls, evil and justice give Colleen Thompson's narrative a haunting context from which to view the desert and inner landscapes. From the very first pages, the reader catches glimpses of the villain's heart before an identity is ever known, creating a chilling effect as the reader understands the current impetus driving the villain but not necessarily the motive or subtle connections. TRIPLE EXPOSURE interweaves multi-layered threads of suspense as the past and present merge, not just from one character but many. TRIPLE EXPOSURE will keep readers guessing until the final heart-stopping resolution. Colleen Thompson creates an intriguing infrastructure that leaves the reader feeling that only the drawing together of this unique hero and this unique heroine could ever unveil the secrets.
TRIPLE EXPOSURE creates an exquisite match between hero and heroine, two people bruised deeply by past experiences who respond to each from the very depths. Despite the fears triggered by her stalker, Rachel is a strong and talented heroine. Photographer and sail plane pilot, Rachel may have been a victim once but she is certainly not a passive woman. She has an eye for beauty and a heart for her family. Colleen Thompson paints a beautiful portrait of father and daughter as well as the underlying resentments triggered by change within Rachel's family. Colleen Thompson's descriptions (as seen thorough Rachel's eyes) of photography and flying are sheer beauty. She captures the very essence of the spirit found in the natural and artistic world. Zeke, the stunningly handsome stranger, the man without a family, has a heart that intrigues just as much as his body and art. Protector of horses and abused animals, Zeke nurtures them, but can he bring his own heart back from despair? Zeke is a man who treasures solitude but as Rachel enters his life, Zeke's true self emerges, both the person that he was and the different man he is today. Colleen Thompson's descriptions of solitude and intimacy create a magnificent portrait of romance as a healing force.
TRIPLE EXPOSURE is not only a powerful romance but also a rich story about family dynamics and about the grief and forgiveness. In TRIPLE EXPOSURE, Colleen Thompson writes a tension-filled tale of a multi-layered danger with an eerie connection between landscape and the human mind. Suspense and romance combine, igniting the hero and heroine with a healing love that transforms, rippling outwards to others and through time, bringing past secrets to new light. TRIPLE EXPOSURE is a must read for Colleen Thompson and Romantic Suspense fans!
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46 of 54 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Complicated plot. A mystery with many suspects. I did not like the heroine enough to enjoy her story., December 9, 2008
This review is from: Triple Exposure (Mass Market Paperback)
STORY BRIEF:
Rachel is an artistic photographer in Philadelphia. She shot a nineteen-year-old stalker Kyle in self defense. She spent all of her money paying lawyers to defend her in the trial. She returns to live with her father in the tiny town of Marfa, Texas. She believes Kyle's mother is behind threatening phone calls and accidents/murder attempts on her life. Twenty years earlier, Zeke was somehow tied to a crime and has been on the run and living as a recluse with a fake name in Marfa. Someone may be after him as well. Rachel took a sensual shirtless picture of Zeke without his knowledge which causes the first conflict between them.
REVIEWER'S OPINION:
This story has a lot of complicated interwoven plot and mystery, which is ok if one enjoys that sort of thing. There is a lot of conflict, dislike and/or desire for revenge among multiple characters. Rachel and Zeke are both objects of people trying to hurt them. Most of the characters in this story are flawed or unpleasant, including the heroine. Early in the story I was thinking "aren't there any good guys here?" No one was appealing to me. I had trouble liking Rachel because of her actions. She is deceptive and dishonest with Zeke about the picture she took of him. She refuses to return phone calls to her psychologist for weeks because she doesn't want to think about a particular event that will help her lawyers. I had trouble buying the relationship between Zeke and Rachel. I felt like the author didn't know how to get it going so she had Zeke forgive Rachel in a way that was too easy and not rational for me. Later they have a fight. Rachel asks Zeke a reasonable question, but he gets mad at the question which had me shaking my head. At times I wanted the story to be over. Readers who enjoy the mental exercises of a mystery full of red herrings may enjoy this more than I did. I prefer more emotional draw in a story.
DATA:
Story length: 321 pages. Sexual language: mild. Number of sex scenes: 2. Length of sex scenes: 2.2 and 2.7 pages. Setting: current day Marfa, Texas. Copyright: 2008. Genre: romantic mystery and suspense.
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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Riveting Texas romantic suspense, July 28, 2008
This review is from: Triple Exposure (Mass Market Paperback)
Photographer Rachel Copeland has spent the past year learning about obsessions. She had only begun to make a name for herself in Philadelphia, still supporting her small studio by teaching at the university, when a nineteen-year-old student's obsessive attraction changed her life forever. An obsession that Kyle Underwood reinforced with lies and doctored porn shots of her on the Internet. An obsession that culminated the night she awakened to find him standing naked over her bed, reaching for her.
The night she shot and killed a young man to save herself.
Then came the press's obsession with the gory details of the trial that ruined her life, although she was proven innocent of anything but self-defense. Not to mention the obsession of the boy's mother for revenge.
Now she has returned to her remote hometown of Marfa, Texas, hoping to find peace and put her life back together. To her father who loves her more than anything, and who stretched his financial reserves to bail her out this past year, and to the disapproval of her step-mother, whose relationship with Rachel has never been an easy one.
Zeke Pike has an obsession, too. An obsession to protect the secret of his past, a past he buried twenty years before, a past that could destroy his life, take his freedom, and cause him to forsake the promise he made to his mother. His self-imposed hermitage in Marfa for the past fourteen years, hand-crafting furniture from desert wood, closed-mouthed and closed-hearted, is a testament to the strength of his resolve to allow nothing or no one to threaten that secret.
Until Rachel's spunky attitude and sense of humor draws him from his shell. Only for both of them to find that true obsessions follow until dealt with, through the miles, through the years.
What follows is a skillful tale of suspense; one whose characters are so - human - the reader roots for them from the very first page. The relationship that develops between Rachel and Zeke is loving and sweet and sexy, a perfect counter-balance to the darkness that tracks them. The secondary character of Rachel's stepmother Patsy, and their uneasy connection are brilliantly written. The mystery is intense and intricately woven, laid down as surely as a treasure map, which leads to its exciting conclusion. This story will keep one turning the pages, to find if these two artistic and caring souls can survive TRIPLE EXPOSURE.
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