Having met Mark Wolfe, FBI Profiler, a few books back I was excited to meet his brother, Liam, in this book. Liam is a former Marine and I loved that this book had this great military angle along with a twisty murder mystery. All in all I was stoked to get into this one, not to mention Griffin has a break out series based on Liam’s security company, Wolfe Security Series. I plan on reading the Wolf Security series once I am done with the tracers series.
In this book we are introduced to potential characters in the Wolfe Security series so that made me excited since this series is winding down I think (there are only 13 books so far). I was fully primed to fall head over heals with Liam but then when I started reading this one, something just felt off. I don’t know that I loved this one as much as I loved others in the series but that’s ok because overall this series is a killer (pun intended!). I think what did it for me was the lack of chemistry between Tara and Liam. For me there wasn’t enough romance to be fully believable.
My biggest take away from this book, was the excitement over the Wolfe Security series by Griffin. Other than that it left me feeling a little meah. It had a dark and twisty mystery which I really enjoyed by Tara and Liam just didn’t mesh for me which made it a little hard to enjoy the romance parts of the story. But I will say the mystery saved this one for me as the mystery was certainly dark and had a lot to uncover and try to sort out. As always Griffin delivered on that front!
Summary
In the ninth romantic suspense novel in the New York Timesbestselling Tracers series, author Laura Griffin brings back her elite cadre of forensic experts as they hunt down the most brutal serial killer yet.
Special Agent Tara Rushing arrives at a grisly murder scene and quickly discovers she’s got a serial killer on her hands. The killer is meticulous, making sure to wipe up even the smallest traces of evidence…but the Delphi Center experts are on the case.
The local sheriff has a suspect all picked out—ex-Marine and current security expert Liam Wolfe. Despite all her digging, Tara knows very little about Liam when she shows up at his sprawling Texas compound, which serves as headquarters for Wolfe Securities, and she’s surprised by her intense physical reaction to him.
As she and Liam grow closer, Tara finds herself depending on his skills and expertise to help her track a killer. But when another body turns up, Tara must decide if she can trust the man who’s quickly stealing her heart. (summary from Goodreads)
Review
Tara wasn’t my favorite heroine in the series. Between her and Alex from the first book in this series, they are my least favorite characters. Tara comes across as this female Rambo who is into shooting, boxing, and just has this brash attitude about her that I just found off putting almost like she was trying too hard. I don’t care if she is more hard and masculine, but it felt like she was more cold and stand-off-ish and I just didn’t love her as a main character. Plus I felt like she has zero chemistry with Liam in this one. All they had in my opinion was hot slightly rough sex and that was it. I had a hard time buying that there was any love between them which made their declaration of love at the end feel a little forced and unrealistic.
Liam did the strong silent mysterious type well though. I liked him but I don’t know that I liked him with Tara. I would have liked to have seen more character evolution from him and who knows maybe we will get that in his own series (Wolfe Security). He was ok and yes he had that sexy Marine swagger about him but there was just something off about him and Tara together that made me kind of read their romance half heartedly. I did enjoy meeting some the Wolfe Security team in this book which makes me excited about reading that series when I am done with this one. While I might not have loved Tara or Liam together, I did enjoy the mystery itself.
This mystery was dark and twisty with lots of things for readers to enjoy form a forensic standpoint. If you love police procedurals or forensic stuff you will certainly find something to love in this book. I know that the mystery saved this book for me. I loved trying to decipher the clues and see how they all fit in the overall narrative and mystery. I too had a list of suspects and ended up being completely wrong. I loved uncovering the details and watching them all come together in this book. Griffin always does such a good job on the mystery, I am rarely disappointed when it comes to the mystery parts of any of her books!
Book Info and Rating
Format: 357 pages, Kindle edition
Published: September 22nd 2015 by Pocket Books
Review copy provided by personal collection all opinions are my own and in no way influenced.
Rating: 3 stars
Genre: mystery, thriller, romantic suspense
The Lit Bitch 