Review: Take Over at Midnight by M.L. Buchman

Posted on August 20, 2014August 19, 2014 by Marlene Harris | Author : Marlene Harris | B Reviews> book reviews

Format read: ebook provided by NetGalley
Formats available: ebook, mass market paperback
Genre: military romance
Series: The Night Stalkers, #4
Length: 382 pages
Publisher: Sourcebooks Casablanca
Date Released: December 3, 2013
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

Name: Lola LaRue
Rank: Chief Warrant Officer 3
Mission: Copilot deadly choppers on the world’s most dangerous missions

Name: Tim Maloney
Rank: Sergeant
Mission: Man the guns and charm the ladies

The Past Doesn’t Matter, When Their Future is Doomed

Nothing sticks to “Crazy” Tim Maloney, until he falls hard for a tall Creole beauty with a haunted past and a penchant for reckless flying. Lola LaRue never thought she’d be susceptible to a man’s desire, but even with Tim igniting her deepest passions, it may be too late now…With the nation under an imminent threat of biological warfare, Tim and Lola are the only ones who can stop the madness–and to do that, they’re going to have to trust each other way beyond their limits…

My Review:

The Night Stalkers are one of my two favorite military romance series; the other is Jessica Scott’s Coming Home. For being in the same genre, the two series are mining almost opposite ends of the trope; Scott focuses on the stresses and strains that having a spouse in deployment can wreck upon family, or about how damn difficult it is to return to civilian of even U.S. Base living after years in the sandbox. Her stories are gritty, real and sometimes heartbreaking.

On the other hand, The Night Stalkers are at the point of the spear. The stories are about soldiers who are currently serving in a forward theater of war. Which means that the stories have to deal with the “hurry up and wait” tension of war and it also requires that all the parties in the romance be soldiers; the women as well as the men. Because their service is in SOAR, The 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, all the soldiers have to be the best of the best at what they do.

An argument could be made that The Night Stalkers are damn close to superheroes, but I digress.

The stories have gone around to all the seats on a DAP Black Hawk Helicopter. The pilot, co-pilot and mechanic have each had their HEAs. Now it’s the gunnery specialist’s turn. “Crazy Tim” Maloney is the last man standing among the Night Stalkers; he’s the only man who hasn’t found a warrior woman to be his match. Not until co-pilot and Chief Warrant Officer Lola LaRue nearly breaks his nose with her helmet as part of her “welcome to SOAR” trip to base.

Of course they fall for each other. But there are multiple roadblocks in the way.

LaRue outranks Maloney, which brings the military non-fraternization regulations into play. She is a Warrant Officer, and he is merely a sergeant. Not that the non-frat regs have stopped two of the previous romances in this series; the Major and the Captain in The Night is Mine (review) and the Lieutenant and the Sergeant in I Own the Dawn (review). Deciding that the rules are worth getting around in their case is just part of the story.

Another factor is the Maloney was born into the same social circle that Captain, now Major, Emily Biehl is part of. A social circle that includes the President, the head of the FBI, and the President’s security detail. Maloney is more connected that he admits, even if he was the family black sheep for a while.

Lola LaRue is not merely New Orleans Creole, but from the wrong side of the tracks and she very nearly took the wrong path. That her corrupt cop dad beat her to the point where her only refuge was a Storyville brothel is just one facet of her story.

But Lola doesn’t trust anyone, particularly herself. And she grew up in a place where sex meant either power or control, but not love. She doesn’t quite believe that she’s worthy of being in SOAR, and she especially doesn’t think that she’s good enough for Maloney.

But when the ultimate test of her capability and her loyalty comes, she proves that she’s more than worthy of taking the pilot’s seat, in SOAR and in her heart.

Escape Rating B: The first books in this series anticipated the Army’s change of heart (or regulation) about women serving in combat positions, and therefore in SOAR. It made the first book a bit more fantastic that it is now that the regulations changed in June 2013.

I enjoyed the story of Take Over at Midnight, and it was great to see how the gang is doing. When I say enjoyed, I mean up until 1 am, because I couldn’t put it down.

At the same time, it felt a bit like I’d read the story before. The problems that LaRue and Maloney face are not that much different from Kee and Archie in I Own the Dawn. The difference is in the rank reversal. LaRue keeps thinking that she isn’t good enough for SOAR or for Mahoney, because her background was so rough, very similar to Kee.

The characters of the couple in this story just weren’t differentiated enough from the previous books. Also, we didn’t really get enough detail on why Maloney went bad for a while, or just how awful LaRue’s dad was. We see that he’s a arsehole, but why? (His disgustingness was necessary for the story, but I didn’t get inside her head enough).

A major subplot has to do with Major Emily Beale’s future. Again, I wanted to be more inside her head to understand why her reactions changed so dramatically. Not that there wasn’t reason, but she doesn’t speak about it and we’re not seeing her point of view. Other characters guess or assume what’s going through her head, but for an about-face as sharp as she pulls, I want to hear her point of view from her.

Still and all, this was a fun military romance of the action/adventure/thriller persuasion, and I can’t wait to read the next one, Light Up the Night. I wonder who’s next?

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: Wait Until Dark by M.L. Buchman

Posted on February 6, 2013December 1, 2013 by Marlene Harris | Author : Marlene Harris | 3 1/2 Stars> book reviews> Originally published at Book Lovers, Inc.> The Rocket Lover

Format read: ebook provided by NetGalley
Series: Night Stalkers #3
Genre: Contemporary Romance, Military Romance
Release Date: February 5, 2013
Number of pages: 386 pages
Publisher: Sourcebooks Casablanca
Formats available: ebook, mass market paperback
Purchasing Info: Goodreads | Author’s Website | Amazon | Barnes and Noble | Kobo | Book Depository (US) | Book Depository (UK) | Publisher’s Website

Two Crack Mechanics, One Impossible Mission

Being in The Night Stalkers is Connie Davis’s way of facing her demons head-on, but mountain-strong John Wallace is a threat on all fronts. Their passion is explosive, but their conflicts are insurmountable. When duty calls them to a mission no one else could survive, they’ll fly into the night together—ready or not.

My Thoughts:

M.L. Buchman’s Night Stalkers series anticipated the U.S. military’s removal of the ban on women in combat positions by casting three women as warriors in the Night Stalker squadron in what I suspect is well ahead of actual events. Notice I said “combat positions” and not just “combat”. In the modern era of warfare, there is no defined front line. Women are serving in combat. They just haven’t been able to be recognized for it when promotions come around in these days of the “all-volunteer” army.

Somewhere in fiction-land, Sam Carter is smiling.

Each book in Buchman’s Night Stalkers series has focused on one of the four seats in a four-seater DAP Black Hawk helicopter. So far we’ve seen the pilot and the co-pilot find their HEAs. This time it’s the Chief Mechanic, Big John Wallace’s turn. Big John has been a mainstay of the crew so far, so it’s only fitting that he should finally get his chance at a happy ending.The thing about the story is that John really isn’t the point-of-view character. That position is reserved for Connie Davis, the temporary replacement mechanic taking over for Kee Stevenson while she’s on her honeymoon.

And Connie is a closed book. We spend a lot of the story, not just waiting for dark, but waiting for Connie to open up a little, even to herself.

Connie is in a LOT of pain. Most of the Night Stalkers have something traumatic in the pasts, either the reason they strove so damn hard to join SOAR, or something that happened after they got there. But Connie is so closed off that she doesn’t let much daylight in, even in the privacy of her own head.

This story is a lot like jokes about being in the Army, “hurry up and wait”.

Connie refuses to get close to anyone. She refuses to let anyone close to her. And we really don’t know why. She doesn’t let herself feel anything. Again, the explanations are left unrevealed because she just won’t go there, even to herself.

While I admire Connie’s tenacity, it makes her damn frustrating as a heroine. Big John is also the strong, silent type. We’ve basically got two people who don’t talk much, even in the privacy of their own minds.

The way their relationship begins is that they are able to fix the helicopter without needing to ask each other for tools or parts–they are just that in sync. It scares her and intrigues him. But it doesn’t give us readers much to work with.

Then John takes Connie home with him on leave, not because he necessarily thinks they might start something, even though he’s finally begun to see her in that light…but because he’s finally gotten through her silent withdrawals to realize that the woman has absolutely nowhere to go. At all.

Never has, and has no expectation that she ever will. Connie has no belief that a soldier can have a future. John and his family teach her otherwise.

John finally gets it through her head, and her heart, that there’s a future worth fighting for.

And not just a mission worth dying for.

Verdict: Unlike the first two Night Stalker books, this one had a surprisingly slow start. The action doesn’t pick up until John takes Connie home with him, and then it’s more about her reactions to his family than the romance.

There is a romance, but it’s of the slow and steadily developing kind. They do get there, but neither of them are people who wear their hearts on their sleeve. This story is a lot more about Connie coming to believe that love and happiness are something worth fighting for.

One of the best parts of this series as a whole is that the women are soldiers every bit as much as the men. There’s a scene in the book that gave me chills. John’s younger sister graduates ROTC and becomes an officer. Connie arranges to be the first enlisted person to salute her. It’s tradition. But instead of seeing an “old boy’s network”, we see an “old girl’s network” start to rise. Very cool.

I give Wait Until Dark 3 and 1/2 shining stars! Somebody needs to salute!

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: I Own the Dawn by M.L. Buchman

Posted on August 15, 2012December 1, 2013 by Marlene Harris | Author : Marlene Harris | 4 Stars> book reviews> Originally published at Book Lovers, Inc.> The Rocket Lover

Format Read:ebook from NetGalley
Number of Pages:416 pages
Release Date:August 1, 2012
Publisher:Sourcebooks Casablanca
Series: The Night Stalkers #2
Genre: Military Romantic Suspense
Formats Available: ebook, Mass Market Paperback
Purchasing Info:Amazon | B&N | Kobo | Book Depository US | Book Depository (UK) | Author’s Website | Soucebooks

Book Blurb:

Kee Smith battled through a difficult childhood to work her way up the ranks of the U.S. Army. When she finally makes it into the elite Night Stalkers, she feels thrilled, honored, and vindicated…until she finds out she’s been assigned to the “girlie-chopper” piloted by the only other woman in the regiment.
Kee is determined to show Lt. Archie Stevenson, one of the male co-pilots, that she is just as tough as the guys. Throughout their special mission, Archie doesn’t know whether to make love to her or plant her face-first into the dirt. But he’ll do whatever it takes to break through that shield Kee wears around her heart.

.

My Thoughts:

This was originally posted at Book Lovers Inc.

M.L. Buchman’s military romance series is about the four soldiers who crew one particular chopper in the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), famously known as The Night Stalkers. SOAR exists; they operate out of Fort Campbell, Kentucky, just as the unit does in Mr. Buchman’s first two books, The Night is Mine, and I Own the Dawn.

What SOAR doesn’t have, at least according to the documents I can find, is female pilots like Emily Beale (heroine of The Night is Mine), or female soldiers like Kee Smith in I Own the Dawn. To which I say, “Damn!”. I want that to be possible.

The fact that the romances in both books violate the military anti-fraternization regulations to hell and back is a whole other matter. But the romance is so damn good in both cases, I don’t care.

What I enjoy about both stories is that these military women are the equal of their men in every single way, including as soldiers.

“Men of quality are not threatened by women of equality”. Sometimes the old clichés are the best ones.

But in the case of Kee Smith, it’s not her qualities as a soldier that are ever in doubt, it’s whether her background on the very, very wrong side of the tracks that has her doubting herself, and whether she’s good enough for a Boston blueblood like Archibald Jeffrey Stevenson III. The fact that he’s a Lieutenant and she’s a Sergeant is just a matter of Army regulations.

That her mother was a whore and that Kee murdered the gang-banger who shot her best friend in a drive-by shooting, that might be a problem for any real relationship. His people go way back. Her people are the Army. Up ’til now, that’s been fine.

But Archie is not what his world would have made him. Not after following seven years in Emily Beale’s turbulent wake through the Army. Whatever he would have been, now he’s addicted to the danger that SOAR represents. That Kee represents.

Kee’s never let anyone close. Not since her only friend was killed. But when their unit finds a little girl in the Hindu Kush, one lonely survivor of her family, walking across Afghanistan alone, Kee sees herself in the girl, and Dilya finds, not just a protector, but an avenging angel.

Dilya saw the man who murdered her parents. And Kee, the unit’s sniper, promises Dilya that she will kill him for her, if she ever finds him. Little do they know just how many rocks they’ll have to turn over to find the bastard, and how many political plots they’ll uncover along the way.

Archie watches over the girl, Dilya, and finds his way into Kee Smith’s heart–even though she wasn’t planning on letting anyone in–not the girl and certainly not the man.

Verdict: If you love military romance, you’ll love this series. When I read the first book in the series, The Night is Mine (reviewed at Reading Reality), I was up until after 3 am trying to finish (it’s a 400 page book!) I Own the Dawn is a terrific follow-up, and I’m overjoyed that Buchman is planning to write about the rest of the crew! Kee Smith is both tough and tender, and her gradual opening up to Dilya as well as Archie is marvelous. In most military romances, the soldier in the story is the man, and it’s refreshing to have Kee be both all-soldier and all-woman at the same time.

When Kee rescues Archie it’s the icing on a very delicious cake. I so love my tropes reversed.

I salute I Own the Dawn with 4 stars.

The Night is Mine

Posted on February 2, 2012February 24, 2012 by Marlene Harris | Author : Marlene Harris | B Reviews> book reviews

The Night is Mine by M. L. Buchman has got to be the lightest-weight military-oriented romantic suspense story I’ve ever read, in spite of the number of times the heroine gets injured. What I’m saying is that I found the story to be a tremendous amount of fun, and I absolutely got sucked way into it the first night, but that I totally checked my reality-meter at the door. And I had a wilder ride than any of the chopper pilots in the story!

Let’s start with our heroine. Emily Beale is a Captain in the U.S. Army. This is totally believable. And she is a helicopter pilot. Again, totally believable. She is also a member of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne) generally referred to as SOAR, the elite unit that transports Navy SEALs and Delta Force teams in and out of covert missions. In other words, she flies in forward combat operations. I want to believe this is possible, but I don’t think we’re there yet.

Emily is the first and so far only woman in SOAR. And as the story opens, she and her unit are watching a profile of her that is being played on CNN. In spite of the secrecy that surrounds SOAR, this profile was okayed by “Command”. Because Emily is not just an ace-pilot. Her father is a career FBI agent and is now the head of that agency. And when Emily was growing up in the suburbs of DC, the “boy next door” that she had her girlhood crush on, well he’s now the President of the U.S. The youngest president ever. And no, he’s not Clinton. And Mrs. President sure ain’t Hillary.

That CNN profile showed nothing of Emily’s piloting skills and everything about how good she looks in her flightsuit and how well she’s figured out how to cook in the desert with minimal supplies. Someone back at CNN turned it into a girlie “puff piece”. Emily is so pissed she shoots the laptop her unit used to watched the profile. The crew buries the laptop with full military honors and gives Emily the tiny flag.

After the profile runs, Emily gets mysterious orders to report to an aircraft carrier in the Pacific Ocean, which is not where she wants to be. After two months, she’s finally earned her place in SOAR as just another pilot, albeit a damn fine one, and that’s how she wants it. All she wants is to fly helicopters. All she wants is to fly. The DC political social whirl is not for her, even if it is the air her mother breathes and the water she swims in like a shark in an aquarium tank. Emily’s sure her mother is behind all the machinations as a move to get Emily back to DC and out of the military. Somehow, someway.

But Emily’s commanding officer, Major Mark Henderson, sees Emily’s mysterious orders and becomes even colder to her than she thought possible. Emily’s never quite been able to live up to the Major’s expectations of her, as a pilot or as an officer. She’s worked all the harder for it. Little does she know that the problem is completely different. Mark Henderson has been bending over backwards to treat her just like any other officer, because he can’t see her as anything except the one woman he wants more than any other. So he’s just a tiny bit colder and more distant than he needs to be, to keep himself under control–because he barely has any. And one misstep will cost them both their careers.

But Emily’s orders are not her mother’s doing. The former “boy next door” is now Emily’s Commander-in-Chief. He’s calling on his best friend to come back to DC and protect the First Lady from repeated, but so far unsuccessful, attempts on her life. Emily is the only one the President trusts.

So Emily goes back to Washington, to the world she left behind, to help her best friend. But President Peter Matthews, back when he was just a Senator, broke her heart when he married another woman, even if he didn’t know it. And he’s breaking her heart again by taking her away from the life she loves, to save the life of a woman she really doesn’t like very much.

And just before she gets on the flight that whisks her away, her commanding officer kisses her goodbye. For real. And Emily nearly breaks his hand and walks away.

So he follows her to Washington, and fakes his way into her secret mission. Then the real fun begins!

Escape Rating B: I started reading this one night at about 11:30, and 150 pages later I was telling myself that I really, really needed to get some sleep. I didn’t want to shut my iPad off; but this is a 400 page book, and finishing wasn’t realistic. I’ll admit I thought about it.

As a character, Emily is a little too good to be true. She’s not just an ace pilot, but all her commanders say that she’s the best they’ve ever seen. Her dad being head of the FBI and her childhood friend being President are both integral to the plot, but it stretches belief. DC may be a company town, but that level of connectedness smacks of a Tom Clancy novel. I will say that Clancy’s aren’t quite this much fun.

What The Night is Mine reminded me of most is Stargate SG-1 fanfiction of the Jack and Sam persuasion. It has the same flavor and the same problem to solve. This is not a criticism, I like Jack/Sam SG-1 fanfic. The issue is that both are in the military, they are in a commander/subordinate relationship and they have to deal with the military frat regs. Jack and Sam are even both pilots, they just happen to be Air Force instead of Army. Faking a relationship for a covert operation that turns real is one of the tropes.

A fun story is a fun story. The Night is Mine is the first book of the author’s The Night Stalkers series. Book 2, I Own the Dawn, will be out in August, 2012. A couple of my nights were M. L. Buchman’s thanks to The Night is Mine. Looks like a couple of nights in August are pre-booked.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: