CROSS & CROWN

CROSS & CROWN by Abigail Roux

Pages: 225

Date: 09/06/2014

Grade: 5

Details: no 2 Sidewinder

Own/Kindle

The blurb:

When Nick O'Flaherty arrives at the scene of a double homicide to find he has a witness to the crime, he thinks it’s his lucky day. But when he realizes his witness is suffering from amnesia and can’t even remember his own name, Nick wishes he’d gone with his gut and put in for vacation time.

Then Nick’s boyfriend and former Recon teammate, Kelly Abbott, joins him in Boston, and Nick finds his hands a little too full as the case and his personal life collide. The witness he’s dubbed “JD” is being tailed by Julian Cross, a retired CIA hitman. To complicate matters further, JD forms an attachment to Nick that Nick struggles not to respond to as they search for the key to JD’s identity.

Trying to determine whether JD is friend or foe as they investigate the crime puts them on the trail of a much older mystery. When multiple attempts are made on their lives, Nick is forced to turn to old enemies and new allies to solve a centuries-old crime before he and Kelly get added to the history books.

My thoughts:

This is going to be a completely spoiler free review which means I won’t be saying anything about the story line. The blurb tells you everything the author wants you to know about this story before reading it and I’m not inclined to argue with her.

I have quite a few things I want to and can say though. Let me start by stating that I loved the story and find myself getting more attached to Nick and Kelly with every story they feature in. In fact one of the things I liked best about this book was the opportunity to get a better insight into these two men and the way they are together. Much as I adore Ty and Zane, I relished this time with Nick and Kelly. I am grateful that these two and their relationship are very different from Ty and Zane. Nick and Kelly have known each other for years, have faced death and trauma together and it gives their relatively new relationship a depth most couples would take years to build.

Taken from Nick O'Flaherty's FB page

The mystery in this book was fascinating and well plotted. I was intrigued from the very first page and held my breath as the story unfolded and secrets were revealed.

History plays a huge part in the mystery in this book and I was intrigued by it all. It is clear the author has a deep love and endless amounts of respect for historical fact. Her depth of knowledge (or research) gives this story the ‘this might actually be true’ quality that always gives books added value for me.

As I’ve come to expect, there is an endless amount of humour in this book. My husband gave me numerous quizzical stares when I burst out laughing while reading. When Abigail Roux writes dialogue I can hear the characters voices and imagine their facial expressions even when they’re not described.

“No ID, no memory, shot in the head in the middle of a gunfight outside a robbery of a used bookstore. What. The. Fuck.” – Nick

The banter between Kelly and Nick had me smiling and laughing on numerous occasions.

“Romantic, but are you sure this isn’t just a history nerdgasm you’re having right now?” – Kelly

While the depth of their feelings for each other was swoon-worthy.

“I love you (...). Has nothing to do with the circumstances, or our history, or how close to death we’ve come together. I would love you in any incarnation of yourself.” – Nick

 

Taken from Kelly Abbott's FB page

My final quote is from Julian Cross. I’ve come to like this enigmatic man more with each subsequent book he appeared in and enjoyed encountering him again here, even if he was more of a secondary character in this story. His calm in the face of pending disaster and his wry sense of humour never fail to impress me while a glimpse of his more vulnerable side made him that much more relatable.

“If you would let me finish before you get your knickers in a twist, this would be easier.” – Julian Cross

This really is all I can say about this book without spoiling the story. I could easily have turned this review into a love fest featuring lots of detail. For the sake of those who haven’t read the book yet I won’t. Some books are best read without any prior knowledge. I’ll just end this post by saying that I can’t wait to see where Abigail Roux will take the story and her characters next. Needless to say, where ever that may be, I’ll be close on her heals.

BALL & CHAIN

TITLE: BALL & CHAIN

AUTHOR: ABIGAIL ROUX

Pages: 306

Date: 17/03/2014

Grade:  5+

Details: no. 8 Cut & Run

Own / Kindle

The blurb:

“Home from their unexpected deployment, the former members of Marine Force Recon team Sidewinder rejoin their loved ones and try to pick up the pieces of the lives they were forced to leave behind. Ty Grady comes home to Zane Garrett, only to find that everything around him has changed—even the men he went to war with. He barely has time to adjust before his brother, Deuce, asks Ty to be his best man. But that isn’t all Deuce asks Ty to do, and Ty must call for backup to deal with the business issues of Deuce’s future father-in-law.

Nick O’Flaherty and Kelly Abbott join Ty and Zane at the wedding on an island in Scotland, thinking they’re there to assuage Deuce’s paranoia. But when bodies start dropping and boats start sinking, the four men get more involved with the festivities than they’d ever planned to.

With the clock ticking and the killer just as stuck on the isolated island as they are, Ty and Zane must navigate a veritable minefield of family, friends, and foes to stop the whole island from being destroyed.”

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My thoughts:

The official release date for this book is today which makes me disinclined to talk about the story. It would be too easy to spoil the story for those who haven’t gotten around to reading the book yet and since I would never forgive a reviewer for doing that to me, I won’t take the risk of doing so now. I’ll limit myself to listing a few things I loved about this book and will hopefully manage to do so without revealing things that I shouldn’t. Of course, the only way to make sure you don’t encounter any spoilers is to do what I did, and stay away from reviews all together until you’ve read the book.

Let me start by saying that I loved this book. For me this book had everything I love about the ‘Cut & Run’ series. There was the mystery and all the high thrills action needed to solve it, not to mention some twists and turns that took my breath away. The fact that it was set in a Scottish mansion with secret passage-ways and located on a remote and private island only added to the sense of danger. I have always loved the interactions between the characters in these books and the addition of Kelly and Nick to Ty and Zane’s double act meant a lot more quick fire dialogue.

The start of the book had me reading with a huge grin on my face, a grin that was semi permanent and only interrupted by moments of laughter. In fact, the grin was stuck on my face for a long time. But on those occasions when the grin did fall of my face it was because there was real pain in the story.

Stolen from B Ty Grady's Facebook Page

I’m not entirely sure what I expected when I started this book. I was ready for residue of Ty and Zane’s last fight, especially since it was followed almost immediately by their separation. Conflict between Nick and Kelly wouldn’t have surprised me either since their intimate relationship was so very new and almost nipped in the bud by their separation. What I was completely unprepared for were the issues between Ty and Nick I was confronted with; deep seated issue without any easy answers. Reading about those was as painful as it was fascinating and kept me glued to the page.

I loved Ty’s struggles when he finds out about Nick and Kelly and his difficulty in determining what exactly is causing him to feel so off about it.

“Stop. The deal is I don’t freak out, and you don’t share sex stories.” – Ty to Kelly.

And I have to admit that I’m falling deeper in love with Kelly and Nick as I read more about them. Kelly’s support for Nick when he’s facing one of the toughest decisions he’ll ever have to make was beautiful.

““The decision you make, you make it for you. Not him.” Kelly whispered in his ear. “You make it for you. And I’ll be here.” – Kelly to Nick

But the Kelly’s words towards the end of this book took my breath away.

 

Stolen from the Sidewinder Facebook Page

““I love you, Nick,” Kelly whispered. “No matter what those words meant before, we know what they mean now. They’re ours now. Just ours.””

Well, those these quotes all but melted me.

Now that I’ve finished the book I should say that I wouldn’t have minded a bit more sexual action on these pages. It wasn’t something I was missing or actively waiting for while reading the book though. The story with all its twists and turns, action and clever dialogue had me in such a tight hold that I didn’t even realise how little sex there’d been until the story had ended.

It sort of breaks my heart that we appear to be nearing the end of Ty and Zane’s story. Of course there still is the ‘mole issue’ to resolve but, as things stand now, it looks like that might be the end of their adventures. Having said that, the ‘Sidewinder’ stories have only started and this book set us up for what promises to be one hell of a storyline in that series. And since Ty is very much a member of the Sidewinder team, the future might not be quite as bleak as I fear. One thing is sure though; no matter where Abigail Roux decides to take her characters next, I will be following them closely, making very sure not to miss a single word in the process.