I’m a sucker for books with a dog on the cover. Especially service dogs. Romantic suspense, one of my favourite genres, and a service dog? That’s my catnip, right there. So I was predisposed to like this going in.
Delightfully, there’s lots of doggy action, as both the hero Jack Daniels (um...right) and the heroine Nichole have dogs. Jack is a SEAL dog handler, and he and his dog Dakota are both recovering from an IED in Afghanistan, one which has seen Dakota invalided out of service and left Jack with serious scars and a lot of recovery still to do. Nichole has pup Rambo, who she picked up hoping he’d become protection against the jerky men who seem magnetically attracted to her, but Rambo needs a lot of training she doesn’t know how to give. Enter Jack.
While this had plenty of great doggy action, it somewhat lacked in suspense, for me. A jerk of an ex and a business rival who keeps coming around don’t really make for great suspenseful action, not when it was obvious from the beginning they were both pitifully outclassed by Jack (never mind Dakota). For a book to be romantic suspense, I think it has to include situations which pose a serious threat to the physical safety of both hero and heroine, and which they then have to overcome together, and this one really missed the mark. I never really even felt like Nichole was in serious danger. This was just a contemporary romance with a Jerk Ex storyline, and as such, I was disappointed.
I actually enjoyed the read - Nichole is no-nonsense, despite previous unfortunate taste in men, and takes no prisoners when Jack has a self-pitying man fail. I like the concept of the series and I loved the dog characters. But the fact that it fails at being a romantic suspense means I cannot give it more than four stars.
Disclaimer: I received a review copy of this title via NetGalley.