Wednesday, January 16, 2013

NAKED HEAT by Richard Castle

NAKED HEAT
By Richard Castle
Copyright ABC Studios
Published by Hyperion

Genre: Crime Drama

Nikki Heat and Jameson Rook broke up. The murder of a muck-racking gossip columnist brings them back together…on the job.

The back-stabbing gossip columnist was stabbed in the back. Fitting, but Nikki has to find out who did it. Before she can, someone steals the body. Against her will, Nikki admits she needs Rook’s connections to figure this one out. And Rook has some interesting connections in the underworld.

Bodies pile up. A star athlete with a grudge and a stalker, an estranged daughter for the columnist, and a cowboy who likes to carve people up. When the cowboy traps Rook and Heat in Rook’s apartment and tries to practice his skills on them, it become very personal.

Then a young pop singer is pulled into the mix. What happens to her is hard for Nikki to handle, but the case moves on.

An old boyfriend of Nikki’s comes back into the picture. Does Petar have something to do with the murders? Or is he the solution to Nikki’s attraction to Rook?

Another twisting, turning murder investigation. Nothing is ever simple in Heat’s life. If it was, why would we keep reading? But you will keep reading, because you have to know how it turns out.


Book purchased from Book of the Month Club. Review by Audrey Shaffer.

Tuesday, January 1, 2013

HEAT WAVE by Richard Castle

Nikki Heat series by Richard Castle

I had some trouble getting into this series. My mistake was starting with the second book instead of the first. Without knowing the characters, I kept confusing them, in my head, with the Castle characters. There are a LOT of similarities, but the differences were jarring. I decided this series wasn’t for me.

Then the publisher offered me the fourth book. I decided to go back to the beginning and read it right. So I picked up the first and third book from the library, and read through. Just like most series, they’re much better when you read them in order!

Audrey


HEAT WAVE
By Richard Castle
Copyright ABC Studios
Published by Hyperion

Genre: Crime Drama


If you’re a Castle (the TV series) fan, keep in the front of your mind that this is the book that Richard Castle wrote, based on Beckett and her coworkers. Until you get into it, keep reminding yourself that this is NOT Castle and Beckett. Also, the TV show is from Castle’s point of view, and the books are from Nikki’s.

Nikki Heat is a NYPD homicide detective. Against her will, she is assigned a ride-along; superstar magazine journalist Jameson Rook. Rook is doing an article on NYPD detectives, and the best way to find out what they do is to be there with them. No matter how much he annoys Heat…or attracts her. Because she’s struggling with both emotions.

A wealthy man falls from a 6th story balcony. His trophy wife insists that he didn’t jump. Looking at the scene in his apartment, Nikki and her crew agree. While they’re still investigating the scene, the wife is attacked. Nikki catches the attacker, and he admits he’s been having an affair with the trophy wife, who stood him up that very day…the same time her husband was killed.

Cut and dried, right? Murders are never that simple in Nikki Heat’s life. Add in a failing business, another lover for the wife, a bookie with a violent sidekick, art theft and forgery. The dead bodies, suspects, and additional crimes keep piling up.

Along with all of this, Nikki is struggling with the memory of her mother’s murder 10 years ago, and her growing attraction to the annoying Rook.

Yes, Nikki gives in to Rook in the first book, unlike Beckett. But then this was written by Castle, so it’s his fantasies that take precedence.

Once I got past the Heat/Beckett Rook/Castle comparison, I enjoyed the book. Not the best crime drama I’ve ever read, but still a good one.



Book borrowed from the Indiana Free Library, Indiana PA.

Reviews on the rest of the series coming soon.