Title: Out of Nowhere
Author: Sandra Brown
Series: n/a
good if not great
Thank you to Sandra Brown, Grand Central Publishing, and NetGalley for allowing me to read a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Aspects of this novel might fall short for some readers; they may feel it’s more romance than thriller or mystery, the mass shooting was blink and miss it, the characters were a bit off, Shawna was a cliche, the villain one-dimensional. And to a degree I agree with some of those complaints, but none of them particularly bothered me or diminished my enjoyment of the novel.
It may feel more like a romance in the beginning, until the cops receive that first break in the case that heightens the tension, but I feel it was a well-balanced mix of genres. The circumstances may feel inappropriate for the cultivation of a romance, but the novel tries to address that, and overall it didn’t bother me. I’m sure there are romances out there that bring couples together in equally unlikely circumstances.
The mass shooting was written in a rather confusing way, in my opinion. Granted, it was from Elle’s POV, so perhaps it was intentionally confusing. But if I hadn’t known the scene was a mass shooting, I wouldn’t have guessed it, because I only recall the first gunshot and victim being described, then just chaos and people running and screaming, then suddenly we’re in the hospital. Elle’s focus was on the stroller, understandably—so was mine—but… I don’t know, it just felt like the scene was abbreviated and misleading.
I liked Calder and Elle well enough. Calder had a clear arc, but I can’t think that Elle did. She might come off as a little cardboard, a little too stoic in the face of her tragedy, but it might just seem that way due to a slight jump in time that skips over the worst of her grieving. Toward the end, though, I would have thought she’d express a little more rage, but she took the final revelations in stride and kept her head.
I got really sick of Calder skipping out without communicating, but I suppose a self-centered person doesn’t just stop being self-centered. He became less so, per his arc, but leopards and spots. He wasn’t the most endearing of Brown’s heroes, and there were moments when he was more annoying than alluring, but overall he was a decent hero.
Shawna was rather a cliche hungry do-anything-for-the-story journalist, and the villain was as psycho as expected, though her plan struck me as actually quite clever.
But as I said, none of these complaints truly bothered me, nor did they detract from my enjoyment of the novel. Overall it was a good Brown novel, though I doubt I’ll revisit it.
A little disappointed! I expected more from this author since her other books held my interest longer. It wasn’t bad, just not as good as expected.