Book 1), Killing Fear (Prison Break

Allison Brennan has been one of my favorite mystery writers since she started. I have all her books and I think I have reviewed most of them, but this one was a letdown. Most have a good romance and a good story this one however was just not as good. Yes, there is gore. Yes, there is a mystery. Yes, this is Duke Rogan's story. Was I disappoointed? Yes!!! First of all the story starts out twenty yrs ago with a couple of revolutionaries who were blowing up buildings. The daughter turns her mom and stepdad into the FBI. The daughter, Nora, falls in love with her FBI contact, who is murdered by her stepdad. Her mom is sent to prison and Nora and her sister to child services. Now twenty years later she is an FBI Agent and her sister Quin is a Fire Marshall.

Once again terrorists are targeting Biotech firms. The latest one is protected by Duke Rogan's security. There is a body this time and it is the owner of the firm who was a friend of Duke's. Duke is immediately attracted to Nora, but although she likes him she clings to the memory of Andy from 20 years ago. As the mystery unfolds it turns out that the deaths from 20 years ago have not been forgotten and now someone is out for vengence.

I really expected a better romance. I was bored by the constant back and forth revelations. When it finally hit the fan you already knew what would happen and it was disappointing. At the end of the book she says she is going to write a new series with a supernatural slant. I think she has reached the end of this type of story and needs to branch out. I will be looking forward to her next novel ORIGINAL SIN which will be out in March of 2010.

I generally like Alison Brennan's books a lot, but this one never really grabbed me - - perhaps because I didn't "like" the main characters enough, or because I thought that the ending was a little weak.

Allison Brennan has handed her readers yet another incredible thriller. Olivia St. Martin as "Livie" has lived with survivor's guilt since the death of her older sister. The only thing helping her make it through each day is knowing the man who abducted her sister - the man she testified against - is behind bars...until DNA turns him loose.

The story takes off and never slows down while she joins forces with Police Detective Zack Travis to stop a serial killer on the loose.

Allison's first two brilliant novels were just a warm up for THE KILL.

Allison Brennan has done it again! She is the master at writing crime novels, and this one kept me guessing until the end. I couldn't put this book down until it was finished! Now we wait for the next two in this series to come out. If you haven't read anything by Brennan, you are missing out on a fabulous author!

REVIEWER'S OPINION:
This was labeled as romantic suspense, and the mislabeling is what bothers me the most. In my opinion, it does not have enough romance or development of a relationship to qualify for that genre. This is mostly mystery suspense with a lot of uncomfortable torture scenes. 95% of the story is about the authorities finding clues and slowly unraveling the mystery about serial killings. The small amount of romance consists of a couple meeting, working together on the case, and getting together at the end. I didn't get the feelings of anticipation or enjoyment that I normally expect from "romance" novels. Once in a while I will enjoy a straight mystery because the characters pull me in, or the dialogue is interesting, or I feel good while reading it. But this book didn't have those effects on me. I think mystery lovers will like this more than I did.

I had a minor problem with the smart good guys doing a couple of stupid or illogical things. Megan was stupid and careless toward the end which caused a major problem. Hans was angry at Megan for reasons I felt did not make sense or fit with his character.

STORY BRIEF:
Megan is a by-the-book FBI agent investigating veterans who had been tortured and killed. Jack is a former veteran and now a soldier-for-hire. He joins with Megan to find the killers after his best friend is killed (one of the victims). We learn early in the story who the killers are (Ethan and Karin) so I'm not giving anything away. Ethan was with a group of soldiers in Afghanistan. He was captured and tortured for three months by the Taliban before being rescued. He is suicidal and loaded with mental problems. Karin wants to learn torture techniques, but Ethan won't teach her. Therefore she convinces Ethan that he needs to capture and torture the veterans who were with him at the time, saying they abandoned him. She plans and helps him capture the vets, and then learns by watching Ethan stick needles into them. The main mystery is finding the killers, but a second mystery is why Karin wants to learn to torture.

DATA:
Story length: 424 pages. Swearing language: strong. Sexual language: moderate. Number of sex scenes: 2. Total number of sex scene pages: 12. Setting: California, Texas, Colorado and Arizona. Copyright: 2009. Genre: mystery suspense.

This trilogy is my first time reading Allison Brennan, and so far I've been less than impressed.

While not as graphic or violent as the first one, this one seemed a bit too heavy on hardcore romance for a suspense novel. It also seems in both books that the culprit ended up being someone who really wasn't part of the story, and was just kind of tossed in right before being revealed. I also thought the female part of this crime group was way too easy to figure out and identify.

I'll read the last one, but not sure if I'll purchase any others.