No Mercy/ Joanna Schauffhausen/ 305 pgs

This is the second book in the Ellery Hathaway series. At fourteen, Ellery was the only girl to survive being kidnapped by a serial killer. Reed Markham was the young FBI agent who found her. The serial killer is in prison, but Ellery, now in her twenties, is imprisoned as well, never able to escape her past or the events of book one. In this installment she is in a victim/survivor group, trying to get back on the police force by doing what they want. She definitely has a long way to go to heal but in the beginning, she's not interested in that. She's more interested in solving the rape of one group member and the killing of another's toddler son in an act of arson. The most fascinating thing about this book is watching Ellery try to navigate the normal world that she feels she can never be a part of and that includes her friendship with Reed. I was relieved that Ellery did not really suffer further trauma in this book (although she sets herself up for an assault). The psychological exploration is intriguing and I am looking forward to the next book.

The Fallen/David Baldacci/420 pgs

Barronville, PA, once a boom town, has seen
better days.  Drugs, overdoses, and deaths are nothing                                 
new to the residents of Barronville.  Things change
when FBI agent, Alex Jamison and her partner, Amos
Decker come to visit Jamison's sister.  While in the
backyard, Decker observes something strange in the                                   
house across the yard.  Upon further investigation, he
discovers the bodies of two victims.  He and Jamison
soon realize that they are hitting too close to home in
their investigation when they are nearly killed...more
than once AND Jamison's brother-in-law mysteriously
dies at work.  This is another good Baldacci read.

The Thing About Love/ Julie James/ 365 pgs

This is a contemporary romance with characters who work at the FBI but I would hesitate to call it romantic suspense because I was expecting a bit more suspense and it just wasn't there. I still liked the book, though. It starts slowly with background on both characters. Jessica just moved to the Chicago office after divorcing her Hollywood husband. John just discovered his girlfriend was sleeping with his friend and he's ready to move across the country to Quantico to take a different path in his career. They went through training together five years earlier and did not hit it off. Jessica thought John disparaged her physical abilities (he thought he was motivating her) and John thought she disparaged his intellectual abilities (she was trying to be distant so as not to spark any nasty rumors). Now, they are assigned to work an undercover job together. I liked both of these characters, especially how they were willing to clear the air about their earlier miscommunications and misconceptions about each other. The undercover job they are working on is very tame. I kept waiting for something explosive to happen, but it really never does. Still, the characters are fun and the author has clearly done her research on the FBI.

A Murder in Time/ Julie McElwain / 320 pgs

I haven't read a time travel in quite a while so decided to give this a try. Kendra Donovan is an FBI agent in the midst of a big raid to bring down a couple of bad guys. Only, one of their own betrays them, resulting in the deaths of fellow agents and gunshot wounds that leave Kendra rehabilitating for months. When she's finally healed she doesn't return to work, instead she secretly sets off to assassinate the one bad guy who's been turned into an informer. She tracks him down to a castle in England and is all prepared to poison him with ricin when someone else shoots him dead. When that mysterious killer then fires at Kendra she stumbles down a secret passageway and ends up traveling back in time to 1815, where there just happens to be a serial killer on the loose. How Kendra fits in, and doesn't, and how she ends up leading the investigation are the meat of this story.

This book is a strange bird. The author head hops--switches points of view--every few paragraphs, often unexpectedly. This is a huge pet peeve of mine and I almost quit reading this book because of it. But I kept going. Kendra is not a warm fuzzy heroine but I was okay with that. She's friendly and grateful when she needs to be. However, it's mentioned at the outset that she is a eugenics baby, apparently bred by two of the smartest yet coldest people on earth. Aside from this small tidbit, nothing else about it was mentioned. Was this a real government program? Or was this just two people experimenting? I have no idea. Also, Kendra is purportedly very smart, but admits she "doesn't know much about this time period," and then proceeds to spout all kinds of facts--awkwardly--about this very time period. In addition, while the author gets so much of the Regency time period correct, she also still gets some things very wrong

All in all, it's difficult to judge this book. Kendra does not get back to the present by the end and there is a sequel that just came out. I may read it down the line, once I've forgotten all the things I didn't like about this one:-)

Haunted/Kay Hooper/305 pages

The small mountain town of Sociable, Georgia has just lost one of its citizens. He was killed very neatly in a locked bedroom in a locked apartment. The town's sheriff, Trinity Nichols, discovered his body after being lead there by her very intuitive dog, Braden. She immediately calls Bishop, head of the Special Crimes Unit of the FBI. He dispatches two of his agents who are currently on another seemingly unrelated case. In addition, one agent is summoned by his sister who lives in Sociable.


This series blends crime solving and the paranormal very well. The series has become so extensive that Hooper includes a cast of characters that includes all the books in which they have appeared as well as a glossary of psychic terms and abilities. I'm almost tempted to go back to the beginning to refresh my memory on the development of the series.

The Final Cut/Catherine Coulter and J.T. Ellison/455 pages/3 December Challenges

Nicholas Drummond, a former spy and now a chief inspector for New Scotland Yard, travels to New York to investigate the murder of his former partner, Elaine York. She was helping guard the Crown Jewels during a exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art. Now the main diamond in the Queen Mother's crown, the infamous Koh-i-Noor Diamond, is missing. Nicholas teams with FBI Special Agent Michaela "Mike" Caine to help recover the diamond and uncover Elaine's part in its disappearance. The chase includes trips to Switzerland and France. FBI Special Agents Dillon Savich and Lacey Sherlock are on hand to assist.




This is a the first in a new series featuring Nicholas Drummond. It was a fun, exciting read. I'm looking forward to more. Three December challenges: 10 Lords a Leaping for the Crown Jewels, 3 French Hens for the trip to France and 2 Turtle Doves for the flights to get there.

Bombshell/Catherine Coulter/392 pages

Another in the FBI Thriller series, this one has two distinct storylines running through it. One involves FBI Special Agent Griffin Hammersmith and his sister Delsey who is a music student at the prestigious Stanislaus School of Music in Maestro, Virginia. She has been found unconscious and naked in a pool of blood in her bathroom. The blood isn't all hers, so Griffin needs to find out what Delsey stumbled into before she is targeted again. Back in D.C., agents Dillon Savich and Lacey Sherlock are trying to find out who murdered the grandson of the former Federal Reserve Bank chairman and if it related to the banking collapse or if it was something more personal.

This is one of my favorite series although there are so many characters now, I may need a chart to keep track. She includes an excerpt of her next book which starts a new series called a Brit in the FBI. She's taking a page out of Patterson's book by taking on a co-writer, J.T. Ellison.