Indirect Lines by Dana Marie Bell Series: ,
Published by Samhain Publishing Publication Date: December 1st 2015
Pages: 280
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There’s only one way to win this game: break the rules.
Halle Shifters, Book 5
James “Barney” Barnwell is losing his ever-loving mind. Between the threat to the white shifters and a riddle he’s been ordered to solve, he can actually go for ten whole minutes without thinking about Heather, the woman destined to be his mate.
As much as he burns to get the redhead under him, the safest place for her is far away from him. If the bad guys catch the barest hint of her scent on his skin, she’ll become a target.
The way Heather sees it, the quicker she helps the stubborn Bear solve the riddle, the quicker he’ll bite her—literally. But when she’s hurt while protecting her cousin from an attack, she finds herself right where Barney never wanted her: smack dab in the middle of the investigation.
Like it or not, Barney is forced to bring her fully into his crazy world. With his mate’s life in his hands, he’s in a race against time to solve this maddening riddle before the enemy discovers that the Hunter has finally been caught by love.
Product WarningsThis book contains explicit sex, graphic language, lots of questions and maybe even some answers. Remember: Fox holds the key.
Cocktails and Books received this book for free from Manic Readers in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect our opinion of the book or the content of our review.
First I want to say that although I have missed a book here and there in this series, it did not impact my enjoyment if reading Indirect Lines or ability to follow along in the story. However, as Indirect Lines is the 5th book in the Halle Shifters series it would probably be best to have read at leas some f the previous books in the series so you are familiar with the characters, their motivation and the conflicts in this particular one.
I wish I could say that I loved the characters in this book, but to be honest, Heather just comes across a young, slightly immature and pretty scattered. On the other hand, James “Barney” Barnwell is everything we have come to expect a Hunter would be. Built like a Mack truck, strong and willing to put the well-being of the packs before his own desires. This is supposed to be the plot of Indirect Lines. Instead it seems that the romance is the actual indirect line here. It did not escape my notice that Bell made the romance between Barney and Heather almost a secondary story to the mystery of the white shifters. What happened between them came across as a side-note instead of the main idea driving the plot.
It seems to me that the Halle shifters are going around in circles with their enemy now. For every three steps forward they take in order to bring them down, they somehow end up taking two steps back. This is a mystery that although we finally get some answers to in Indirect Lines, we have yet to fully solve or have closure to. So although this does not end in a cliffhanger, it does in fact leave the mystery of who is targeting the white shifters open to hopefully be solved in a future book. Which of course means that we are still on the hook and will need to read future books in order to absolve us of the curiosity.
Overall, I enjoyed the action and the ongoing drama surrounding the attacks on the white shifters. I just wish Barney and Heather’s relationship was explored as the focal point of the story. Indirect Lines was an interesting read and I enjoyed reading it, but it was not my favorite by this author.
