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ginaardito's review
3.0
I'm not 100% sure how to categorize this story. It's flawed as a romance, flawed as a spy novel, flawed as political intrigue. When political reporter, Maris, needs her air conditioning repaired, the man sent to handle the job, Jake aka Michael, is more attractive than she's prepared to handle. They wind up in her bed around the third time he shows up to repair her a/c. A visit or two later, they're madly in love. It's an odd setup for a romance since aside from sexual attraction, we're never treated to any idea why the two are so connected to each other. Thus, we're never really convinced of them as a romantic couple. As the heroine in a spy novel, Maris is clever enough to figure out where her spy lover might be and finagles press passes to events so she can get close to him, but is at the same time TSTL and even winds up kidnapped when trying to track him down. Jake/Michael's POV is never really told to us so we're given a wink-wink-nudge-nudge "that's top secret" explanation for all of his adventures. Thus, it falls flat as a spy novel or political intrigue. Key scenes are left dangling over the passage of time where one chapter ends on a cliffhanger and the following chapter is days or weeks later with the problem solved and no more mention of it. Secondary characters are either over- or underdeveloped with no rhyme or reason. This story could have really benefitted from a savvy content editor, since it's clear the author knows the world she's creating but has no idea how to rein in her knowledge to focus on a specific genre story. More focus on the relationship would have made this a great romance. More focus on the espionage could have created a great novel of intrigue. Instead, the story tries to straddle the lines and didn't work for me on either front.
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