Book Review: "Point of No Return" by Susan May Warren

Summary from BN.com: An American boy and a warlord's engaged daughter have disappeared—together—in an Eastern European border country. Only one man can find them in time to prevent an international meltdown—Chet Stryker. But Chet is taken aback when he realizes the boy is the nephew of Mae Lund, Chet's former flame. When Mae insists on rescuing her relative herself, Chet knows he has to protect her from the enemy on their trail. Yet can he protect himself from falling for Mae again?

Susan May Warren is one of my favorite romantic suspense authors because she uses her international knowledge and infuses them into her stories. Her specialty is lies in stories that place in Russia and Eastern Europe since she has actually lived in those areas. If you've read her previous books based in these countries, you will recognize some of the characters from those stories. The story takes the reader to Georgia (the country, not the state) in a international chase involving kidnappings, arranged marriages and terrorists.

While the book is fast paced and enjoyable, there were a few things that annoyed me. One was Mae still calling her nephew Joshy like he's 6 years old, even though he's in college and probably does NOT want to still be called that. Her character is also a bit annoying at times because it's very hard for her to trust people therefore she puts herself in needless danger when she doesn't have to. The other was the whole dramatic revelation that seemed way too soap opera-ish. Then people start acting in roles that just 5 minutes ago they didn't know existed and now they act like they have to right to do so. I honestly felt like I was reading an episode of Days of Our Lives on location in Eastern Europe. I rolled my eyes a lot during this scene.

That being said, there was a huge redeeming factor for me with the end of the story. Without revealing what happens, I was thrilled to see that a promise was kept and there was no cliched ending. In fact I was rather surprised because almost every other romance book I read would have ended it in that way. I'm not too sure that the Love Inspired Suspense format is the best for Warren. One of her strengths is allowing the reader to get to know the character and these books are way too short to allow that. Diehard fans will enjoy the story, but new readers to her books will do better to read her other books instead first.

Point of No Return by Susan May Warren is published by Steeple Hill (2011)

This review copy was provided for a blog tour with LitFuse Publicity