Review: Silent Scream

Silent Scream
Karen Rose
Romantic Suspense
Book 11 in Loosely Connected Series
Grand Central/May 25, 2010

From the back cover ~

He Knows Your Secrets.

When a teenage girl dies in a suspicious fire, Detective Olivia Sutherland is assigned to track down the arsonist. Then she discovers something more sinister: a vicious blackmailer who preys on young people and murders without hesitation. Making her work even harder is sexy firefighter David Hunter. He's not only sharing the case but sparking memories of their long-ago night of passion, when feelings were left unspoken and hearts were broken.

He Hears Your Pain.

David has his own ghosts, and a million regrets. But while he and Olivia try to face the wall of pain between them, a diabolical puppet master is pulling strings to make a group of twenty-somethings do his bidding. Soon Olivia and David are scouring the city for a calculating criminal who seems tantalizingly close—and is moving in for the kill.

Finally caught up on this loosely connected series. If you haven't started reading Karen Rose and you're looking for well written characters and story line, definitely give her a try. In Silent Scream the hero and heroine have appeared as secondary characters in previous books. I do think plenty of background information is given on them that this can be read as a stand-alone but I would still recommend reading the previous books.

There is no doubt Olivia Sutherland is a good cop and a strong heroine. She does have some weaknesses but she doesn't let them interfere with her job. One of her weaknesses is David Hunter. David and Olivia have a history, they have a connection through their families and through a night over two years ago. Olivia has tried to forget David but I never got the sense that she really did. When she finds out he's not only moved to Minneapolis but is connect with her latest case, she has mixed feelings about seeing him again. I'm glad Rose didn't have Olivia fawning over David and his killer good looks. She tries to keep things on a professional level but... that doesn't quite work out.

David Hunter has some serious ghosts and guilt riding his conscience. He also has no memory of what happened the night he hooked up with Olivia Sutherland. Oops! Just one more thing for this sexy firefighter to feel guilty about. We first met David in Don't Tell, book 1, so his story has been brewing for some time. I do think he has matured since then and is trying to have a better outlook on life - letting go of some of that anger and guilt. It was nice to see him evolve instead of remaining stagnant.

The suspense and mystery were well developed. I liked how Rose had the blackmailer behind the scenes, manipulating the action. Rose allows the story to point to a few potential characters as the blackmailer, keeping the tension and suspense high. There is a lot of police procedure in this story, with the detectives trying to follow the dots and connect the various crimes together. Sometimes it was a bit too heavy but then Rose would lead us back to Olivia and David, keeping a decent balance between the romance and the suspense.

Olivia and David made a good, believable couple once they got past their rocky start. They did have a lot to discuss and both had baggage that got in the way. I did like how Olivia was the "leader" in the suspense aspect of the story but David made plenty of contributions towards finding the blackmailer. He had a couple of slip ups and should have shared information quicker with Olivia but when he did, she didn't brush him off because he wasn't a cop. They worked well together.

Silent Scream is another entertaining addition to Rose's loosely connected romantic suspense series. Next up, Rose heads to Baltimore and some new characters in You Belong to Me. Release date of June 7.

Rating: A-