Freefall by Jill Sorenson (Aftershock #2)
May 28. 2013
Romantic Suspense
Harlequin

Reviewed by Mandi

Awhile ago I read Aftershock, a book about the after effects of being trapped in rubble after an earthquake. While I liked the action and suspense, I wasn’t convinced of the romance. Unfortunately, the same thing happens with this book.

Hope is a park ranger and is looking forward to a weekend kayaking trip with her high maintenance sister but before the fun can begin she gets an urgent call to investigate a single engine plane crash. A man, who happens to be a guy she had a one night stand with that ended not so great, was climbing at night and witnessed the crash. Sam hiked it back to the ranger station to report it. Leaving her sister Faith with the kayak crew, Hope rushes back to see what she can do. Having no one else available to climb with her, she reluctantly asks Sam to come along. Sam is an extreme rock climber and an Olympian medalist, so he is definitely up for the challenge.

Emotionally though Sam is a bit unstable. He lost his fiancé in a horrific climbing accident and then suffered and lived through an earthquake in San Diego. He has no memory of his lover dying, yet he still gets stressed and nervous when he climbs with other people. These two discover a dead pilot, but not because of the crash. The pilot was murdered, and there are duffel bags of drugs. When Hope gets word that Faith is with an unexpected passenger on the kayak trip, she worries that could be the murderer.

This sets up the beginning of the story but there is much more that unfolds. Although Sam and Hope had a one night stand awhile ago, they don’t really know each other. To me, Sam comes across as very devastated by his fiancé’s death and not in a place where he is going to move on. And while Sam doesn’t declare love right away (there is a time elapsed at the end and an epilogue) I still had a hard time with the romance. Sam and Hope just didn’t fit together. Part of the reason is that Javier (“bad guy” who escapes plane crash) and Faith (Hope’s sister) have a love story of their own that I found fascinating. Javier, while at first may appear to be a villain, has a good redemption sort of story. And while Faith at first comes off as as spoiled brat, I ended up liking her too. I wish this book had been theirs and Sam and Hope had happened off page or something.

I think this author can write well done suspense scenes, but by the end I was exhausted. There is scene after scene of high intensity action. Again, well written but so much. It not only took away from the romance but by the end with all the different players involved, it became convoluted and not so believable.

This series (although Aftershock and Freefall can be read as stand alones) is just too much action and not enough romance for me.

Rating: C

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