From Maui to Montana

Life Flight

Lynette Eason

Book 1 in Eason’s new Extreme Measures series, Life Flight opens at full speed and never lets up. EMS helicopter pilot Penny Carlton must make an emergency landing on a rugged North Carolina mountain in a raging storm. Desperate to get help for her injured patient, she sets out on foot and encounters an escaped serial killer prowling around the same area. An old friend of Penny’s—FBI agent Holt Satterfield—coordinates the effort to recapture the convict. Descriptions of the killer’s victims are nongraphic, but his motive and methods are truly creepy. A blooming romance between Holt and Penny, along with hints of backstories, leaves plenty of loose ends for book 2.

Elysium Tide

James R. Hannibal

Workaholic neurosurgeon Peter Chesterfield isn’t happy about leaving London for a forced vacation in Maui. But once he discovers a mortally wounded woman floating in the surf, he has a new purpose: to find the person responsible for her death. Detective Lisa Kealoha is annoyed with this obnoxious, conceited Brit nosing into her investigation, but she can’t deny his knowledge has been helpful. As they dig deeper, they realize they’re dealing with something far bigger and more dangerous than anyone expected. When Dr. Chesterfield has a near-death experience, he begins to reevaluate his atheist beliefs. Is his intelligence blinding him from acknowledging a greater power? He wonders if there’s something more beyond this life. Elysium Tide is slightly tamer than Hannibal’s usual international intrigue but still a fast-paced read.

Among the Innocent

Mary Alford

A masked man slaughtered Leah Miller’s family. She was the only survivor. Now 10 years later, she’s a Montana police officer and must investigate a wave of new murders with the same MO. These cases are eerily reminiscent of her past, but her family’s killer was supposedly now dead. Could they have blamed the wrong man? Is the real bad guy back to finish off Leah? Fresh from Denver, the new police chief, Dalton Cooper, arrives just in time to this quiet Amish community to help solve the crimes. He has his own hidden motives for wanting to exonerate the original suspect. The victims—young Amish girls—are frustratingly naïve, but the plot is plausible.

Fatal Code

Natalie Walters

When Elinor Mitchell’s scientist grandfather dies, she inherits his old notebooks containing pseudo codes to a nuclear weapons project he worked on in the 1960s. Nefarious players want the codes, so now Elinor has a target on her back. Meanwhile, someone is stealing information from Elinor’s aerospace company. The Strategic Neutralization and Protection Agency—or SNAP—is tasked with proving her guilt, but team member Kekoa Young, the hunky Hawaiian cryptologist installed as her neighbor to keep an eye on her, believes she’s innocent and being framed. Mutual attraction grows between Kekoa and Elinor, but before they can explore a relationship, they must first find out who’s out to get Elinor and her grandfather’s codes.