REVIEW: Show No Fear / Marliss Melton / Forever, Hachette Book Group

Title: Show No Fear
Author: Marliss Melton
Publisher:  Forever, Hachette Book Group
Date Published: Sep 2009
ISBN: 978-0-446-50927-5
Format: Mass Market Paperback
Length: 292 pages
Genre: Romantic Suspense


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Lucy Donovan is somewhat of a CIA legend. It seems there’s no risk she won’t take to complete her mission. However, after being captured and tortured on her last field operation, Lucy is diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and ends up behind a desk for several months. Anxious to get back into the fray and to prove to herself and everyone she works with that PTSD is no longer an issue, Lucy is thrilled to be assigned to a UN team headed to Bogotá charged with the task of recovering two American prisoners from that country’s home-grown terrorists. If the team can’t manage the task through negotiations, she’ll rescue the men her way. Except…

Lucy, who always works alone, is saddled with a jungle-savvy Navy Seal by the name of Gus. They are to go into Bogotá undercover as a married couple who are actual UN team-members. Their job? Identify the camp where the captives are being held so that a Seal team can extract them and find out what’s going on with the suddenly silent and mysterious terrorist organization named FARC. And things get worse: it turns out that Gus is her college lover, who she dumped (after surviving a bombing) in favour of fighting terrorists. Neither of them ever resolved their feelings for each other.

As they are thrown into forced intimacy and as the pressure of the work builds, the two give in to the obvious passion they still share. Lucy is determined to show none of the fear she’s trying to deal with, and Gus is determined to show her, through their unusual partnership, that she needs to embrace life instead of putting her’s continually on the line because of survivor guilt and the need to fight her own fears.

Show No Fear is an interesting romance packaged within the framework of a convincing CIA extraction. Author Marliss Melton has done her homework and weaves a believable tale of political intrigue and terrorism set in the mountainous jungle just outside of Bogotá. Strange and unexpected situations involving the rebels (FARC), the Columbian army, and elite, American trained Venezuelan soldiers escalate the danger level of the mission to a point where both agents must fight for their lives.

This is only the 4th or 5th novel I’ve read by a woman author who weaves tales about romance in the midst of war. All of these novels have an added element of emotion, a depth, to what could just as easily have been traditional and convincing action or suspense novels. Are the stories better or worse for the added dimension? No, I would say they are simply different.

If you enjoy good suspense, lots of action, plenty of plot twists and realistic romance, then Marliss Melton’s Show No Fear is for you. I’m sure you’ll also be pleased to know there are 6 other books in this “Navy Seals” series.


Copyright © Clayton Clifford Bye 2010




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