Kat Martin is back with another thrilling Maximum Security novella filled with danger, suspense and one smoldering road trip to the mountains of Mexico! When her best friend’s son is kidnapped, private detective Lissa Blayne drops everything to focus on the missing boy. Julie and Lissa have been close for years, so when Julie’s friend Colt Wheeler joins the investigation, Lissa bristles at the … bristles at the former ranger’s take-charge attitude. Lissa doesn’t need a man calling the shots, even if there is something about Colt’s protective side that has her tough exterior melting away. As Lissa and Colt take their search on the road, the tension between them slowly morphs into trust and understanding–and they’ll need both in order to outsmart the dangerous abductor they’re tracking. The only thing hotter than their attraction is the heat of the Mexican sun, but this road trip is no vacation…
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Great book
Thanks go to the publisher and Net-Galley for the complimentary copy of Before Nightfall by Kat Martin for the purpose of reading and reviewing prior to publication. My opinions are my own and no one has influenced them.
Before Nightfall is an extremely fast-paced novella that whizzes by. The writing is tight, and the characters are typical of romantic suspense. I haven’t read the previous two books in this series, so at times I did feel a bit lost. This novella is definitely supposed to bridge the gap between the second full book to the next in this series.
Lissa Blayne’s character is that of a hardened investigator who has plenty of cynicism towards the dredges of society and is not interested in a long-term relationship. The story moves so quickly, there wasn’t much time to become vested in her character. I did enjoy her loyalty to her best friend and determination to find the friend’s young son.
Colt Wheeler is a great hero who jumps in to help find his late buddy’s missing son. His attraction to Lissa is untimely since he’s on his way to Denver to start a new life. I enjoyed his straight-forward personality.
The romance between the main characters is based on the physical attraction that crackles between the hero and heroine, and it has little time to develop into something deeper. The story ends with a happy for now instead of a happily ever after. I found this appropriate since they didn’t have much time to see whether they can truly develop long lasting affection along with the physical. I like that both characters are willing to compromise to see where their attraction can go.
If you enjoy lightning fast action with characters driven to succeed, and willing to work together to achieve their goals, then you will like Before Nightfall. I do suggest reading the other two books in this series prior to reading this novella. Happy reading!
This is a Maximum Security novella with employee Lissa Blayne. Her best friends son is kidnapped by the ex-husband & Lissa works with Colt, family friend of her best friend to find him. You will love both Lissa & Colt along with the secondary characters (except for the ex-husband of course). It’s a great, action packed read that you will definitely enjoy!!
Good read for a short airplane ride.
Good short story. I liked the characters and the plot of this book. Hope we see more of Colt and Lissa. Looking forward to reading the next installment of this series
Excellent!!
Kidnappings are hard but take your heart out and shred to pieces when it involves a child. When Lissa’s best friend Julia has just that happen to her she jumps to the aid. Another one of Julia’s friend also comes to the aid and he is like skin to a grater for Lissa when his attitude chaps her hide. As they work together though they do learn to see each other and build that trust that will be needed to find Julia’s son. The chemistry also can not help but build also which puts a bit of different kind of heat in this. Knowing whom is the kidnapper does help also alot with as I said since a child is involved we will be pulled every which way. Suspense is the pill of the day with this and that romance is the liquid to take it down with.
It’s a novella; it’s a kidnapping of a child; and, it’s investigators to the rescue! The story-line is quick action; meeting the right people; and, getting the job done. The writing is excellent and made for a great afternoon read.
This was the fast-paced read that I’ve come to expect from Kat Martin. Lissa and Colt have their work cut out for them when they team up to bring Lissa’s best friend’s son home, but they don’t give up in their hunt. They DO give up on fighting any attraction they feel toward each other, but that attraction only serves to solidify their camaraderie and determination to find the missing boy before anything worse happens.
It felt like this read was nonstop worry and action from the first page, which made it all fly by so fast, I was shocked when I reached the end. But now I can’t wait for the next book in this series, because I’m sure it will deliver in the same manner.
Kat Martin’s series are always good and this one is no exception! Read the series…you won’t be disappointed!
I’m a fairly new fan of Kat Martin’s books, and more specifically, her Maximum Security series. As this was book #2.5 in the series, I expected it would be somewhat shorter than books #1 and #2, and I’m really glad I didn’t start reading the series here because I would have been clueless about the Maximum Security agency and it’s varied operatives/detectives/ex-military/SEALs/etc. As it was, and since I voluntarily requested an advance reader copy, it found it hard to read than most of the other ARCs I’ve read and reviewed. Some of the chapters started in the middle of some of the sentences of the preceding paragraph, amd in quite a few instances, it was hard to determine which character was speaking. For these and some additional issues I’ll get to, the best I can give this short novel is 3 stars.
Early on, Julie, a friend of Max agency private detective Lissa Blayne’s, calls her in a panic. She’s just been contacted by her abusive ex-husband, Ray Spearman, whom she’s not heard from in 8 years. He wants to see his children and when they aren’t at her home when he shows up, he breaks a lamp and says they’d better be there the next time he shows up. Instead, he kidnaps his son from his school. While this is happening, Julie receives a surprise visit from Colt, who promised his dying friend and fellow operative, Liam Douglas, to look in on his wife and kids–Julie and her children. At this point I was utterly confused and by the end of this short novel still hadn’t made sense of this conflict. If Liam was Julie’s husband, and was the father of her children, how did they suddenly become the children of Ray Spearman? No mention was made of the fact that he might be her second husband, or if he’s their stepfather, and, in that case, unless he legally adopted them, they aren’t his children at all and he has no rights where they are concerned.
Once Ray has Timmy in his clutches, the chase is on with Lissa and Colt on his trail, and that trail leads to Mexico. En route, their intel is that Ray has become a major player in a dangerous drug cartel, and he’s holed up with Timmy in quite a fortress in Mexico. With the help of additional connections in both the U.S. and Mexico, Lissa and Colt hatch a plan to kidnap Timmy and return him to his mother without anyone getting killed in the process.
As Lissa and Colt agree to team up and head for the border to retrieve Timmy, their sexual attraction to one another burns up the motel sheets several times, and the planning and rescue operations are exciting, dangerous and complex. To say this short novel is fast-paced is the understatement of the year, but what was sacrificed by it’s brevity was any real character development, an explanation of Timmy and his sister’s paternity, a better explanation of what Max Security is all about, and who some of the secondary players in the novel fit in, as well as any deep emotional connection between Lissa and Colt. And even when we get to the expected HEA ending, it’s given short shrift, and it left this reader rather disappointed.
Quite honestly, I know that Kat Martin is a far better writer than is exhibited in this novel. Her previous novels in this series were gripping reads with characters you got to know and understand fairly well, and the relationships between them developed at a more reasonable pace. If you’re a fan of action/suspense romances, I highly recommend starting with the first two novels in this series. This wasn’t a bad novel, it simply wasn’t enough to really sink my teeth into, and for me to care about it’s main characters to any degree. Hopefully, Ms. Martin’s nest Maximum Security novel with be more fully fleshed out and a more satisfying read. I’m looking forward to it.