So, I’m going along in my blissful life, waiting for my guy to get off his ass and pop the question and trying to put my next self-help book to bed, when I’m interrupted by a mental intruder. I’m suddenly doing a ride-along inside some stranger’s head, while the attached set of hands strangle a guy in the back seat of a car.
It felt like I was killing the guy. But I didn’t, because I woke up cussing (not unusual) in my own bed beside my sexy cop and my blind bulldog. Said sexy cop then gets a text about a body, and I know it’s the man I just sort of murdered.
Turns out Mister Picture-Wire Necktie isn’t the only victim. One of the others was punched in the face by our 19 year-old sort of kid in front of 20 witnesses right before he vanished. Jeremy is brought in for questioning by Mason’s own co-cops.
The only other suspects are a woman who beams sweetness and light like a freakin’ earthbound angel, and an old horror movie star who’s supposed to be dead. And if those two are murderers, I’m Miz Manners.
Mason wants them to be guilty because it would clear Jeremy. He thinks I’m keeping things from him, which I am. He thinks I’m not putting Jeremy first, which I totally am. This whole thing is getting between us. So I’ve gotta solve it, fast.
Even if it means going face-to-face with a serial killer.
But the vigilante is more broken than I bargained for, and is determined to silence me. Permanently.
I live in the teeny, tiny town of Taylor, NY, (Alliteration Alert!) though my mailing address is Cincinnatus, my telephone exchange is Truxton and I pay taxes and vote in Cuyler. All of these are at least in the same rural county in the southern hills of New York State; Cortland County. There are more cattle than people here. The nearest “big” cities are Syracuse and Binghamton and they are an hour away, in different directions, and not really all that big by most standards, though they both seem humongous to me. I look out my window to see rolling, green, thickly forested hills, wildflower laden meadows and wide open blue, blue skies. My road is barely paved. The nearest neighboring place is a 700 acre dairy farm.
My house is a big, century old farmhouse. I moved in here after my divorce in 2006. Just a little over a year later, the house, which I had named, SERENITY, burned. It was 99% gutted, and I lost my two dogs, Sally, an 11-year-old great Dane, and Wrinkles, my 14-year-old, blind bulldog. This was the culmination of my Dark Night of the soul, which had seemed to hit me all at once in 2006-2007. My mother died that year, after a 14 month battle with pancreatic cancer. She was only 60. The youngest of my five daughters had left home that same year, and while that’s not a tragedy at all, it felt like one to me. Then came the divorce. And finally there was the fire--it seemed my darkest night wasn’t quite finished with me after all. I had lost almost everything before that point, and as I poked through the wet ashes and soot the next day, I realized that I had now been stripped all the way to the bone.
No better time to start over. (And no, I didn’t come to that realization that day--there were a few days of wallowing in pity first, particularly the day after the fire, when I hit a deer and smashed up my car, which I was practically living in!)
That’s when I started to laugh. Just sat on the side of the road as the deer bounded, uninjured and carefree, out of sight, and laughed. It was just too ridiculous at that point, to do anything else!
And from there, I picked myself up, and brushed myself off, and said, okay, there’s only one way to go from here. Forward. And that’s what I did. There I was at the age of harrurmphemmph, living in my one, mostly undamaged remaining room, with a dorm-sized mini-fridge, a futon, a TV, my cat (nine lives!) and a laptop. And not much else. (Though thank goodness the room that survived the fire, was a room that had its own attached bathroom!)
Since then I have rebuilt my beloved home, which really has become my haven, my “Serenity.” I share it now with my fiancé, Lance, and we have accumulated quite the little family together. “Little” being a relative term. We have a pair of English Mastiffs, Dozer and Daisy, who weigh 203 pounds and 208 pounds respectively, and a little pudgy English Bulldog named Niblet, who is bigger than both of them, inside her mind. We also have the aforementioned cat, Glorificus (“Glory” for short,) who adores her canine pups and keeps them firmly in line. And we've acquired a pair of stray cats as well, a mother and son, Luna (Lulu for short) and Butters aka Buddy. Lulu showed up pregnant during a lunar eclipse, had a litter, and vanished again. We found homes for all the kittens except one. Butters. We got him fixed and kept him. A few months later, Lulu returned, again expecting. This litter was born on the "Monster Moon." Again, all the kittens were spayed and neutered and placed in homes, and this time we got Lulu to the vet in time to spay her before the cycle could repeat.
Glory is not amused.
She has a story of her own, my old Glory cat, having been with me before the Dark Times descended, she went through it all with me, moved with me, survived the fire, and remains with me still. She's tolerating the newcomers. Barely.
My partner is an artist, a mechanic, a welder and an inventor, and the rumors are true, he is much younger than I
Rachel is her usual self, still debating everything with her IN (=Inner B**ch) and using, but still trying to keep it secret, her NFP (=not f*cking psychic)! She's just plain fantastic! And her inner dialogue is as good as her aloud reasoning!
Also Mason is good, even if he's slightly overshadowed by Rachel. Still he's just perfect for her!
And let's NOT forget Hugo and Myrtle! I can absolutely see Rachel dressing them like this! LOL
The story is liked to MS's The Gingerbread Man and I loved how the stories mixed!
I'm always sad when I finished reading a book in this series, because I know that I have to wait for the next!
When Detective Mason Brown is called out to investigate a body found wrapped in burlap and partially buried, he knows that this is the murder that his girlfriend, Rachel de Luca, saw in her dreams the night before. What she didn't see was the fact that there are several graves nearby, all containing men who had been reported missing. Do they have a serial killer?
It's been so long since I've read a Brown & de Luca story. The author is putting too many years between these stories. I'm happy to see them back. Rachel is her usual acerbic self. Her dialogue with her "Inner B*tch" is sometimes very funny. She and Mason are perfect together, trying to get to the bottom of this murder before the wrong person is arrested for the murder.
There are a couple of characters in this book that were featured in Shayne's "The Gingerbread Man". It is not necessary to read it before picking up this book, but you may like to get background on these characters. My rating: 5 Stars.
I love these characters. Always happy to get a new book in this series. Rachel de Luca is a one of a kind character with her abilities and her inner thoughts are always hilarious.
The story also had plenty of serious subject matter. A vigilante killer, teenage alcoholism, and all forms of mental health issues. This made for a captivating read from beginning to end. I cannot wait for the next de Luca and Brown book!!
**Trigger Warnings for those who need them: Discussion of childhood sexual abuse ***
I really enjoyed going back into the Rachel De Luca world because she is such a fun character to get to know. Rachel is focused on moving her family into their new home, getting her office setup and hopefully getting Mason to move this relationship to the next level. When a nightmare wakes her, this one she's scared to discuss with Mason when he gets the call to go where a new body has been found. They are jsut starting to get over what happened when Josh's friend went missing and now they are looking for a killer.
As the story develops we re-visit a story that L have loved for years The Gingerbread Man, which is a haunting romantic thriller, about missing children and a child predator. To this day that story haunts me, so it was good to see old friends again even if it meant dragging their story out into the light. Rachel is still trying to get a handle on her new ability to tap into the NFP knowing she has going on when she ends up meeting Lily Newman. As she digs deeper into how her gift is working now she accidentally uncovers a small mystery.
It appears a serial killer is on the loose and no one can figure out what the victims have in common. Until one of the men disappear, he just happens to be Jeremy's professor who called him a liar and Jeremy reacted by punching him in the nose. Now Jeremy is a suspect and Mason is losing it. He's trying to find a way to get Jeremy from under suspicion while finding the killer responsible before the missing man becomes a victim. Rachel is feeling the pressure to perform and quickly.
As the story unfolds, Mason and Rachel find themselves moving slightly out of sync. Mason is aware Rachel tried to lie to him, and now he's wondering what it is about this case that her covering for someone who could clear Jeremy. Rachel knows what she has seen can't be admitted into court and while she's never willing to risk her new family in this one case she's willing to bend the truth to protect Mason. Jeremy is starting to ask questions that Mason can't answer and it's all coming out and Mason is struggling.
It's awesome reading them struggling with getting it right as parents and lovers. They are in sync most of the time and this case, and what's happening with Jeremy is throwing them for a loop. They never seemed to have the growing pains of most relationships, but now they are working on it. I loved the tension between them forced them to get real clear about what they were looking for. I loved how they handled the growing pains they were having as a family as well with Jeremy admitting he was struggling with everything. They felt so real compared to how characters can be written sometimes. I loved that Rachel could turn to her sister when she needed advice but at the end relied on what she knew about Mason to help her make the right call for them.
The whodunit part of the story was well done and when it all was revealed I was like "holy hell". I knew based on what happened to Lily that it would have to do with child abuse but to realize how far some would go to try to 'cure' themselves made me sad. And yet I wanted to know like how could someone go that far in life and not realize that their plan wouldn't work?? Then I realize it's a human failing and was kind of thrown when she mentioned that the medallions were given to certain people and wondered if they all knew what had happened to them. Then I wondered if the woman realized that she was just as bad as those she condemned?? I just was so addicted that I finished the story in one day.
I highly recommend the story my loves, especially because we get an update on previous characters that we love. I love that they didn't have a perfect life but a good realistic one even all these years later.
This is the 7th book in the Brown and De Luca series. It’s been a long while since the last book but it reminds me how much I love this series. Rachel is NFS but she has a gift or a curse however you want to look at it. Mason is a cop and I just love them together. Someone is Murdering Bad Men and the worst kind of men and Rachel is in the murderers head. When Jeremy is accused of murdering his professor it’s a race against time to prove his innocence. The characters are so well written you feel you know them. The action and suspense is super intense. The the ending is shocking. If you haven’t read this series your definitely missing out. What are you waiting for grab the first book now.
It’s been a few years since the last Rachel and Mason book, so took a bit to refresh. But to have characters from Shayne’s other (and best title) Gingerbread Man, made me ecstatic! This was a fast and fun read, full of Shayne’s trademark thrills and chills and humor!
When a man is found murdered and partially buried next to the river, Rachel De Luca saw the murder being committed through the killer’s eyes. At the man’s funeral, no one mourned the man but all felt relief that he was gone. He was found to be a pedophile who was abusing his own son. Rachel knew that Ivy Newman had committed the crime but she saved a little boy by doing it. Ivy had been kidnapped when she was five and held a prisoner for years until she escaped. Now she is attending a support group of women who have been victims of sexual abuse as a child. Rachel sees the women wearing a pendant identical to the one worn by Ivy during the crime. Are the women vigilantes? That is Detective Mason Brown’s take on it. He just has to find proof.
Even though Mason and Rachel have misunderstandings, they confirm their love for each other and she knows he's got her back. In this book, Jeremy (Mason's nephew) is accused on a murder that was committed by the group and Rachel doesn't think Ivy should be punished. Mason doesn't agree and thinks she's being evasive. But they work it out. Great series!
I should give this book 3 stars, but it gets 4 because I love the characters so much and am so glad that Shayne is continuing to write stories with them.
I also think the plot had good potential; it just suffered from less than stellar editing and beta feedback to the writer. There were a few weak plot points and character motivations that kept the story from being as strong as the first 3 or 4 books in the series. And, a few copy editing errors which I don't remember noticing in the earlier books.
Despite that, I really enjoyed spending time with the characters again, and I was intrigued with the bones of the story. Basically if you're a Brown & De Luca fan, this is absolutely worth reading. If you're just looking for a good thriller or romantic suspense, this story is average.
The content of this one could potentially be more triggering than previous books in the series, so if that's a concern for you, look into it.
I appreciated the ability to give Rachel and Mason's relationship tension without having them break up.
There are a lot more pop culture references in this one that really pin this series to a very specific time period. Some of which already feel dated despite it being released in the last few years. Not a complaint necessarily, but its going to feel out of touch for future readers.
Still a very strong series, and in a world of 700+ pages fantasy novels (that I also love) it's really nice to have a quicker 250 page read that still feels like the complete package.
Another book in the Brown and DeLuca series. I would recommend reading in order though I don't think anyone would be lost without having read previous books, knowing the character histories helps understand some of the relationships. I do love these flawed characters. The MC Rachel is just fun and feels like a real person. I like the mix of the characters personal relationships and the mystery/crime side of the book. The mystery/crime had a lot of clues for the reader to figure things out. I love the coming to terms and evolution and even the flaws of Rachel's NFS abilities. Overall a good read.
I have loved reading this series, but reading this book I feel the author is not showing respect to her reader base. The timeline does not align with the other books to date, and other facts were changed to suit this story (prior serial killer arrested...). While I respect this is fiction, when you create a world for your readers you should hold to the truths of that narrative. Readers get just as invested in books, and know the facts, don't disregard that to bend the narrative part way through the series.
Aside from that, I enjoyed the basis of the story, as I have the rest of the series.
4 stars but maybe just because of that epilogue! About time indeed!
I did enjoy this one, I felt there was a little more mystery to it and a good red herring too. I loved Reggie and hope that we hear more of him in future books. I did go into this one wondering what on earth could this family go through and came out thinking, 'Please don't make them go through more!'
A solid 4 stars, I just find these too easy to read. They are one sitting read books for me. Now to move onto the next one!
Omg! This series is amazing. Can hardly wait for the next book. This series is one of my favorites and now I’ve got a new author to follow!
Mason and Rachel are fire together. The “NFP,” the suspense, the crime fighting, and most of all the ROMANCE... you’ve got to read this series! The kids and the rest of the family and friends all make this story even better.
I hope the author can be persuaded to add a couple more books to this series. Maggie Shayne creates such intriguing characters and I love the snappy dialogue of Rachel de Luca. Only Maggie can pull off those quick witted comebacks Rachel is known for.
This series gets better with every book! Every character has grown and Rachel remains as fantastic and snarky as ever! The swear jar in the house must be bursting! So looking forward to another!!
What a ride! I love these characters...Rachael is scary smart and between her potty mouth, no filter and the abilities she has....Well you are in for quite a story.
The love story is down to earth, I adore that. There family is a hoot. Their loyalty for their own...epic.
This book had some tough subject matter, child predators, teenage alcoholism and support.
At the end of the book there's a excerpt from Gingerbread Man. The characters are the same and maybe linked with this book's plot! Looking forward to read it!
I absolutely loved this book an can not wait for more. This series has me in love with all the characters. I can Myrtle now with her lil goggles riding in the T-bird. A must read.
3.5 stars. I enjoyed it cause I love these characters but I thought the tension between Rachel & Mason was stupid and I didn't buy after everything they have been through together.