All her life Sidney Morrow had tried to repress her disturbing psychic visions. Until a vision of murder shattered her fragile serenity. She had to go to the authorities-make them listen. But Lt. Marc Cruz didn't trust her one bit. In fact, the sensual homicide cop treated her like a suspect. And sent her senses haywire.…The dark-haired beauty knew something about the serial killer Marc was after. But he was certain "visions" had nothing to do with it. Determined to be her constant shadow, Marc wasn't prepared when desire blindsided him-and put them both in the path of a relentless killer.
Good characters. I liked the psychic parts. I disliked heroine stupidity and conflict caused by miscommunication.
REVIEWER’S OPINION: I was really enjoying this most of the way through – thinking a good 4 stars. But then the author used two of my pet peeves which frustrated me and brought it down to 3 stars.
(1) After they have sex for the first time, they each think the other doesn’t like them and therefore treat each other badly. She looked unhappy, so he felt rejected and acted cold to her. She in turn felt rejected and acted cold to him. The truth was she had a headache. All she had to do was say “I enjoyed sex with you but now I have a headache.” I’m sorry, but I just don’t like conflict based on vague communication. It’s a cheap way to have conflict. Much better is basing it on actions, events, personality clashes, or other people.
(2) Heroine is extremely stupid at the end. She knows who the killer is and goes to his house alone. Of course something bad happens to her.
Other than the above, I enjoyed the characters and how their relationship developed. I enjoyed the scenes where her psychic ability allowed her to know things and caused some interesting interaction. The ending explanation of how the killer did what he did was odd. But this is fiction, so I’ll go along with it. There were several sex scenes, not the hottest, but they were pretty good.
STORY BRIEF: Sidney is psychic. When she touches someone she sees what they are thinking or their recent actions. A serial killer has killed two women. The dog of one of the victims comes to Sidney’s home. She touches the dog and sees things related to the killing. She gives information to the police, which is how she meets Marc who is investigating the murders. At first she is a suspect. The newspaper prints an article about her helping the police as a psychic. The killer then breaks into her home and leaves a dead cat on her bed. Marc is trying to protect Sidney while he investigates. They are drawn to each other. A secondary story involves Sydney’s sister who is going through a divorce.
DATA: Story length: 205 pages. Swearing language: mild, including religious swear words. Sexual language: moderate. Number of sex scenes: 7. Estimated number of sex scene pages: 13. Setting: current day southern California. Copyright: 2008. Genre: romantic suspense.
I have some seriously mixed feelings about this book, but hardly any of them are good feelings. The suspense portion of the book was well-done, but where it fell flat for me was the romance. If ever there was an example of the hated misunderstandings/miscommunication plot devices, this is it. It didn't happen just once...it happened over and over again. One second they were smiling and talking with one another, the next second one of them would say something extremely hurtful. All the way up until the end, I never could figure out how they truly felt. I wanted to punch them both in the face for about 75% of this book. I'm not sure there was even one secondary character in this book that I didn't actively dislike except for the dog, Blue.
Having said that, the ending was sweet and the mystery held my interest, so it wasn't a total bust. It might be a while before I pick up this author again.
I have happy romance buttons and this book pushed lots of them. I have a weakness for the obsessive romance where the reader knows the whole romance is fucked up but the ride is so good you can't put the book down (Can't Hurry Love by Molly O'Keefe, Black Ice by Anne Stuart, pretty much anything Elizabeth Hoyt has ever written) and this book fits the bill.
Also, the hero was a complete dick most of the time. That's not actually a complaint. He made me laugh and I looked forward to every moment he was on the page. I loved the way he tried to pretend he did have any emotions. I loved how his neat, carefully-dressed self always ended up in the mud. I loved his control issues.
There is no hiding that this book has flaws. The heroine has some incredibly stupid moments, a conversation would solve several problems in this book that drag out, and I found the heroine to have moments of character inconsistency. A reader without the same happy romance buttons won't probably won't enjoy the book as much as I did.
This is a fairly new to me author who has something I like in the way she writes so I'm not giving up on her, even though I didn't rate this book that high. In the afterword of this book it says this is her first book to be published.
I liked the story, the animals, the psychic angle. I really didn't like what a cruel, unprofessional character Marc was for much of the book. I thought both main characters were TSTL at several points in the story and there were some pretty unbelievable parts. I also thought it was pretty foolish for Sidney to run after the killer near the end of the book. Other than that, there was some redeeming features. I liked how the author portrayed the drug dealer next door, the gay policewoman and Sidney's obnoxious family.
“Dangerous to Touch” is an interesting story of ostracization, preconceived bias and evil. In the beginning of the book the author Jill Sorenson stated that this is her first published work, it is an excellent start! The storyline was suspenseful, the characters multi-dimensional and just an over all good read. Good luck Jill and I’ll be sure to look for your name on new releases!
ในฐานะที่หนังสือเรื่องนี้เป็นเล่มแรกที่จิล ซอเรนสันเขียน แม็กซ์ให้คะแนนสอบผ่านนะคะ แต่สำหรับนักเขียนที่เขียนเรื่องอย่าง Crash into Me เธอสอบตก เพราะเรื่องนี้ไม่อาจเทียบกันได้เลย
I've been wanting to read this book since it's release but somehow other books in my TBR managed to bump this one. As this is Ms. Sorenson's debut, I was nudged to delve into it because of a Debut Reading Challenge. I'm so glad I did!
Our heroine is a woman who shuts herself off from human contact as she has the gift of touch. It's this gift that brings her to our hero, Marc, the detective searching for a serial killer. When a jealous reporter reveals that the police are working with a psychic, it puts Sidney in danger. Sidney and Marc both have insecurities and this makes them real. I loved how Marc, though indeed a hero, is flawed and Sidney doesn't hold her punches pointing them out to him. The suspense is great and adds to the sexual tension, though Sidney and Marc sure didn't need the danger to heat things up between them! I'm looking forward to reading Ms. Sorenson's next release out in April.
I randomly picked this book out to read because I had entered to win a copy of Sorensons' recent book "Wild" and didn't win it. The description of that book had me wanting to try it out, but not buy it yet. The local library didn't have that book available, but it did have this book by Jill Sorenson. So I checked it out and thoroughly enjoyed it. I've recently read a book where the main character had this psychic ability off of touch, so that wasn't exactly a "novel" idea for me. But the progression of the romance, the storyline and the mystery/suspense were very well done. VERY well done. The romance was "real", with a bit of a modern edge that made it feel like it could really have happened. Overall a quick, solid, enjoyable romantic suspense.