Heartbeats by Susan Rae

Brand spankin' new author. First book. Back to contemporaries for me. Back to my true love - romantic suspense. I think this review will be short and sweet. I enjoyed this book. Immensely. No huge emotional investment here. Just a very satisfying read.

We have Elizabeth, a doctor and Drake, an FBI agent (you know how I love my secret agents, men in uniform, and all around hunky cops!). They met in college and had a weekend fling. Six years later they meet up again. Seems someone is out to get Elizabeth. Drake puts himself on the case.

While there are some very formulaic elements in this book, I found them to be very well done. And, I don't mind well done formula. After all, isn't formula what made romance novels so popular? It's why we all got hooked in the first place, right? Boy meets girl, boy and girl have obstacle, boy and girl overcome obstacle, boy and girl admit love for each other, boy and girl have HEA. Right? Well, you can add in a few other formulaic elements to this story - a child produced from their weekend fling, unbeknownst to our hero; our heroine in danger from unknown source; hero's big buttinsky family; the fat, rude, accusatory detective on the case. Still, Susan Rae handled it all quite well, and kept the story flowing and interesting.

I found this to be a quick, delightful, escapist read. While published by Berkeley, it could easily have been a SIM. Same type of story, just a smidge longer. After all the heavy duty emotional historicals I've been reading lately, it was a refreshing change. Thanks for the recommendation, Anne. I am sure that we will be seeing more of Susan Rae.