Barbara Freethy

Always With Me is the start of a new series set in Whisper Lake. It serves a dual purpose — it sets the scene by introducing a large number of characters & it gives us Gianna & Zach’s story. This story is well written with well defined characters. The scenery is well described so you can paint a picture in your mind as you read. The small town atmosphere is portrayed perfectly even down to the busybodies.

Gianna came back to town to help her aunt out. She’s been engaged three times & show more called all three off. Something was missing. Back in Whisper Lake, she runs into an old boyfriend & realizes what was missing - none of them were Zach. Too bad he broke her heart & stole something from her. When she needed help, he seemed to be there looking out for her. Can she trust him?

Zach couldn’t believe that Gianna happened to be back in town at the same time he was. He’s hoping that helping rehab the old summer camp will help him heal. He remembers the first six weeks of summer camp fondly, until he was sent home. He didn’t expect the chemistry to still be there with Gianna. When she had secrets pop up in her life, he had to help her. Can he trust her?

I love second chance romances like this story. It grabbed my attention from the first page & I couldn’t put it down until I was done. I had to keep reading “just one more page” to see what new secret came out. Ms. Freethy’s attention to detail & graphic descriptions set her stories apart from others on the market. Her characters are realistic & relatable. There are even characters popping in from her long running Callaway series. This was a great start to a new series & I can’t wait to read more about Whisper Lake. show less

Good first book in the series. The beginning sets up the backstory of the seven brothers, where the death of their mother fractured the family, especially when it came to their relationships with their father. The brothers are all shocked by the unexpected death of their father, and more so by their inheritances. This book is about Luke.

Luke is big into extreme sports, both doing them and making films about them. For the past ten years, he has been all over the world and done just about show more everything. He is stunned when he receives a mountain resort as an inheritance. He's the last person who would want a piece of property tying him down. He has no idea why his father left him this property - until he arrives to check it out before deciding whether or not to sell it. There he discovers that the resort manager is his former college sweetheart, Lizzie.

That first meeting was quite a shock to both Luke and Lizzie. They had been deeply in love while they were in college until Luke's restlessness caused him to quit school to pursue his dreams. He wanted Lizzie to come with him for the summer, joining in his adventure. Hurt and angry when she didn't show up, Luke forged ahead and never looked back. Lizzie had been on track for a career as a concert pianist. She was just as in love with Luke but chickened out of going with him, afraid that if she did she would end up giving up her own dreams to follow his. Though she later tried to contact him to explain, he refused to listen. Though Luke's career is going strong, Lizzie's came to a dramatic end when her sister died, leaving Lizzie as guardian of her thirteen-year-old niece, Kaitlyn. Luke's dad gave Lizzie the job at the resort so she could better care for Kaitlyn.

I enjoyed seeing the rekindling of the relationship between Luke and Lizzie. Luke has kept his emotions bottled up for a long time. The attraction that still burns between the two of them starts to break down the walls around Luke's heart. Likewise, Lizzie had thought she was long over Luke and is dismayed to discover otherwise. It isn't easy for them to spend time together at first, but Lizzie is determined to show Luke the benefits of keeping the resort. I enjoyed the scenes of Lizzie showing him around. The descriptions were vivid enough for me to be able to picture them. As the chemistry between them continued to grow, they needed to come to terms with their past before they could move on with their lives. Though each tended to bring up the same points multiple times, they were able to discuss them in a relatively adult manner. But it was a crisis involving Kaitlyn that opened their eyes to the other's point of view and served to finally bring them together. I liked the solution they came up with, and look forward to seeing more of them in future books.

I liked both Luke and Lizzie. Luke is a good guy, whose success has not gone to his head. I enjoyed the scenes with him interacting with various people at the resort. I also liked the way that he connected with Kaitlyn and understood her grief over the deaths of her parents. I loved the way that Lizzie willingly gave up her career for Kaitlyn. Her patience with Kaitlyn and her attitude was fantastic, especially with some of the horrible things Kaitlyn said. Though there were times I wanted to shake Kaitlyn until her teeth rattled, I also ached for her, especially as more of her story came out. The scenes with her on the trail had me on the edge of my seat until it was all over. show less

This is book 7 in Ms. Freethy's long running "Off the Grid: FBI" series. The early books were OK, but nothing terribly special. With this one, she has really hit her stride. Savannah, an FBI agent, has returned to her hometown to support her childhood friend, whose husband Paul, has just died in an accident/possible suicide. Ryker has also come to the funeral, as he was the leader of the Army Ranger squad the deceased, Paul had belonged to. They are surprised to meet, as they had had a brief show more and very memorable one night stand while both were in the military serving in Afghanistan, and had never expected to meet again. The ranger unit had later been ambushed, losing two of their members and injuring others, and all had left the service with various forms of PTSD. Ryker had drifted apart from his teammates, feeling they did not need to deal with his issues. Guilt abounds, particularly when another teammate at the funeral, Todd, accuses Ryker of abandoning them. Savannah has her own guilt for losing touch with her friend in order to avoid strained family issues at home. So there's the set up. Then while leaving the funeral, Todd is involved in an accident sending his car into the river. Savannah and Ryker begin to suspect that maybe it was not accident. And maybe Paul's wasn't either. Savannah and Ryker join forces to find out what it going on, and find themselves rekindling the old attraction.

It's well-written, suspenseful and doesn't gloss over the issues both need to deal with before worrying about a relationship. (Though being the type of story it is, things move VERY fast.) The plot they need to uncover, while not perhaps terribly plausible, is complex and intriguing. I thoroughly enjoyed this one. show less

Pretty nifty romantic suspense thriller by Barbara Freethy. A con man marries and deserts a woman on their wedding night. An engineer returns from an extended business trip to find his identity was stolen by the same con man. The abandoned bride shows up at his door, thinking her husband lives there, only to find how badly she was deceived. But she has a picture of the con man, and the engineer realizes he knows him . . . and has a score to settle. They team up to bring him down, and off we show more go. Our heroine, Kayla, soon learns that she wasn't a random mark, but that old secrets hidden in her family since the 1950s have made her a target.

It's a complicated plot, maybe a bit too convoluted. And the smoking attraction between our two avengers flares up rather too quickly for believability. But still, it's a fast-paced absorbing thriller that can be forgiven for few unlikely moments. show less