2005

Newly divorced Lilly Martin is packing up the last of her belongings at her recently sold mountain cabin. Lilly's ex is Dutch Burton, police chief of Cleary, North Carolina, a town that has been plagued by the disappearances of five women. When a severe snowstorm strikes, Lilly is late leaving the cabin. Ben Tierney is a journalist who specializes in reporting on extreme sports who just so happens to be up in the mountains burying one of the missing dead women. When Lilly hits Ben with her car during the snowstorm, the two are forced to work together to make it back to Lilly's cabin and wait out the storm. When Lilly opens Ben's backpack she discovers a pair of handcuffs and a blue ribbon, which is the serial killer's signature. While holding a gun on Ben, Lilly handcuffs him and accuses him of being the murderer. Meanwhile, Chief Burton becomes frantic when he receives a cryptic call from Lilly. His jealousy and suspicions go into overdrive as he and his childhood buddy, Wes Hamer, plot to rescue her.

From the opening pages of this thriller, everything points to Ben Tierney as a serial killer. Yet his manner and moral strength do not match up with those of a brutal killer. Every time you think you have the plot figured out, the author throws out a few red herrings. Sandra Brown fans will definitely enjoy this thrill packed romantic suspense novel.
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In Cleary, North Carolina a small mountain town, five women have disappeared, assumed to be the work of a serial killer. The town is full of interesting characters: the local pharmacist and his spinster sister still live together in their parents house; the head football coach is a notorious skirt-chaser, and his son was dating one of the missing girls; the police chief has returned to his old hometown in disgrace after being fired from his job in the big city; his ex-wife, Lilly, is suffering from a private grief of her own; and Ben Tierney, a ruggedly handsome outsider, loves the outdoors and visits Cleary frequently.

A car crash causes Lilly and Tierney to be stranded together in a remote mountain cabin just as the worst snowstorm in recent history hits the area, leaving the roads impassable and help unable to reach them. Unbeknownst to Lilly, the FBI has recently zeroed in on Tierney as a possible suspect in the case of the missing women, since his visits to Cleary seem to coincide with the disappearances. As the two of them hunker down in the cabin to wait out the storm, Lilly begins to have doubts of her own about Tierney.

This was pretty much the perfect trashy novel, it had everything - suspense, romance, sex, humor. The first sentence and the last sentence were both knockouts with "wow" factor (I take my hat off to Sandra Brown because I think that is a rarity) and everything in between was pretty great, too. I was on the edge of my seat every minute, and guessing right up to the end. I can't recommend this one enough. ( )

This novel starts off with a ridiculously coincidental premise, usually not a good way to start a novel. Lily Burton is on her way home to Atlanta from selling a cabin in North Carolina with her ex-husband, sealing their failed marriage, when during a bad snowstorm she hits a man that she knows, Ben Tierney, a writer who she has been flirtatious with in the past. Tierney is suspected of being a serial killer. Ironically, Lily’s ex-husband, Dutch, is the police chief of a town in North Carolina where Tierney supposedly killed five women. It’s all a bit hard to swallow and not remotely believable.

Even though the premise is a bit much, Sandra Brown does a nice job of putting it together with her polished prose. She is a talented writer, who with a better plot, could certainly write a better novel. Plot holes abound in this story and there is a good bit of synthesized melodrama, but it still remains a fairly enjoyable read.

Carl Alves – author of The Invocation ( )

This one had be guessing until the very end. I loved the storyline; however, I gave it 3 stars because of the sex scenes. They were so not needed in this story. This was the first Sandra Brown book that I have ever read and will probably be the last if all of her books are smut. I did like the thriller aspect, though. ( )