Month: December 2018

Not If I Save You First by: Ally Carter

v7845_notifisaveyo_4cc-200x300

I was a little leary going into this after reading her Embassy Row Series, which left me feeling like there should be another book. I still can’t even sum up those books without feeling lost.

This, however, was a short and sweet read. This story is about survival, adventure, friendship and a budding romance.

Find the boy.

Save the boy.

Kiss Kill Make the boy pay

For what he did to you.

Being the daughter of a secret service agent attached to the President has some perks. Especially when the President has a son your age and you become best friends, and you  go running around the White House together. Suddenly, tragedy strikes at the White House, causing Maddie and her father take off to Alaska to live in the middle of nowhere with no internet, phones, tv or other people. Maddie writes daily letters to Logan and has her dad send them when he goes to town for supplies. After two years of Logan not responding she stops writing him letters.

Logan, after getting into trouble along with slipping away from his secret service agents numerous times, is sent to join Maddie and her dad. With a fierce storm on the way, Maddie’s father is sent out to give supplies to some people who will be in need. Her dad tells her to make Logan chop wood and help with her chores. While they are out looking for wood they are attacked and Maddie is pushed off a cliff, presumed dead by both the Russian kidnapper and Logan, while Logan is kidnapped.

When Maddie finally comes to she realizes it’s up to her to save Logan. Having lived in these woods for the past six years, Maddie has an advantage over the kidnapper. She  catches up to them and allows herself to get “captured”. Trying to survive the Alaskan wilderness and a Russian kidnapper proves to almost be too much for the pair. Using the survival instincts her father has taught her, after escaping from the kidnapper she is able to get herself and Logan to safety for the night . After some rest and food, they head out to try to retrieve the sat phone their Russian capturer had. And that’s where things get interesting, when a simple rescue mission turns into a much larger problem.

Publication March 27, 2018  Pages 293 YA-chosen for the 2019 Lonestar List so it is good for middle grade

 

Lighthouse Beach by: Shelley Noble

36204074

Who else would borrow a van and a dress from her local consignment shop to attend a friend’s wedding, whom she meet at fat camp and hasn’t seen in 15 years, but Lillo? When a wedding invitation shows up in the mail, Lillo feels pressured to attend. She hasn’t seen Jess in such a long time that when she shows up she does not know anyone there. She soon makes friends with Diana and Allie, who are Jess’s college friends. Jess does not know if she really wants to go through with the wedding, which is why she invited Lillo in the first place. Jess is a weak-minded person when it comes to her father and sticking up for herself and Lillo is the strength she never had. After finding her fiance with another woman, Lillo and the gang kidnaps the bride to be. With nowhere to go and Lillo having the only car between them, they load up in her borrowed van and head to Lighthouse Beach. On the way there they end up with a flat tire, stuck on the side of the road. A biker gang eventually happens by and stops to help. Not realizing that she and Lillo know them, Jess jumps out of the van to attack the bikers before they get Lillo. Lillo clears the misunderstanding and gets everyone calmed down, then they get the tire changed. They end up going to Lillo’s cottage to rest and recoup before heading on a girls road trip. As the day goes they end up deciding to just stay at Lillo’s for the week. Lillo has had something traumatic happen to her in the past and since then has shoved that past in boxes into a spare room and prefers to be alone than in the company of anyone.

Diana is CEO of her own app company. Needing to call her assistant, she has to go walk along the beach for reception and while out there spots a “prince on a white horse, well maybe gray horse,” to quote her. When she gets back to the cottage and tells Lillo about him, she confirms it is Ian a vet who lives down the road. Ian has some past issues of his own that cause him to be more of an animal person than a human person. Diana loves horses and actually has some of her own she has to have in boarding but never has the time to ride them. Willing to do anything to ride the horses, she convinces Ian to let her muck the stalls and even pays him to let her ride with him.

The biker gang that came to the tire rescue is made up of Doctor Ned Hartley and a group of doctors, mechanics, CPA’s, etc. They travel around to towns that are in need of help. They stay a week at each place before moving on to the next town. Lillo had went to college to become a doctor and after her traumatic experience, she quit and became a landscaper. Doc is short-handed at the clinic and ask Lillo to come in and assist him. She turns him down at first but slowly gives in and goes to help stock shelves and rooms in between patients.  

Jess’s dad and goons arrive and try to take Jess back and things end up going astray and Mac gets shot and with Lillo being the only “doctor” around she springs into action to save her. Their week together is coming to an end and now Lillo is feeling lost all over again, knowing the girls are leaving and the bikers are about to head to the next town. Finding out what happened in Lillo’s past I can say I never seen coming. I was starting to feel a little lost like I missed something but then bam everything is revealed and it all gets explained.

I have to say that, yes, this was a good book but the ending left me thinking “Wait, that’s it?” as it is a little cliffhangy with no other books to follow. This story is told from three POV’s Lillo, Mac and Diana.

Publication May 29, 2018, 398 pages, Contemporary Romance