There is an element of suspense in all my books. In Pulling Her Resources, the couple investigates corruption in the heroine’s workplace. They need to procure a crucial piece of evidence. In order to mask their breaking and entering to her company's offices, they put on a live opera show including bare-chested male dancers (link below). As lively as that scene was, it's still not the action-packed, life-threatening adventure you get with "real" romantic suspense books.
Laura Griffin writes that the best novels combine the three P's: Problem that the heroes solve, Proximity—they are together a lot, and Pacing—the book must be fast-paced. The next novels deliver on all three.
"Whiteout" by Adriana Anders is one of the best romantic suspense novels I’ve read. Angel is a chef and an unlikely action heroine. A group of mercenaries kills her friend, and she foils their plans while falling for a glaciologist who happens to be in the same trouble as she is (running away from the bad guys). The setting is a remote station in Antarctica: subzero temperatures and a hostile, impossible-to-live-in environment on one side, and on the other, a haunting beauty and isolation.
“No. No, that wasn’t all she could do. She was alive, wasn’t she? She had no idea what or how or if she’d die in the process, but she was going to find some way to stop these men. Now.”
(Whiteout, Chapter 6, P49)
Cindy Gerard’s Taking Fire's premise is the best: In Kabul, a beautiful Mossad agent named Talia Levine seduces Bobby, an American military contractor:
“She’d be playing with fire once she engaged him…and as she watched him…she knew she regretted volunteering for this op. But the endgame was what drove her…”
(Taking Fire, Chapter 1, P11)
After he leads her team to the Hamas leader they were after, she leaves. Understandably, he hates her guts and feels used. Six years after they first met, Talia and Bobby happen to be together at the American Embassy in Oman, right when it gets bombed. Talia is the target due to her prior mission in Kabul. Now Talia has to admit to Bobby that they have a son, and the clock is ticking as Hamas has kidnapped their son and he is being held hostage.
I read this book after October 7th, and it was triggering. I continued reading because this was a romance. So, unlike in real life for so many hostages and their families, here at least, there will be a happily ever after.
Do you have a great romantic suspense book you want to tell me about? let me know in the comments.
Further links:
Links:
The dance of the Furies - The Hofesh Shechter Dance Company in The Royal Opera's production of Gluck's Orphée et Eurydice.
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