REVIEW: Ride the Fire by Jo Davis

Title: Ride the Fire (Firefighters of Station Five, #5)
Author: Jo Davis
Format: paperback, 310 pages
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Source: review copy from Fiction Vixen
Published: December 2010 by Signet

After he lost his wife and children to tragedy, Capt. Sean Tanner drowned his pain with alcohol. Now, fresh from rehab, he wants to regain the trust of his team and begin again. The last thing he needs is to have feelings for beautiful firefighter Eve Marshall. But even as they dare to explore their growing desire, Sean learns that his family may have actually been murdered. And that a shadow from his past has returned to finish off Sean-and anyone he loves.

Why I Read this Book: I read Line of Fire, the 4th book in this series, earlier this year and really liked it. When I was given the opportunity to read Ride the Fire, I jumped at the chance. Romantic Suspense is becoming one of my favorite genres to read.

What I Liked: I like that I got closer to Sean’s character. Ride of Fire is the long awaited story of Sean and Eve. Poor Sean has been through a lot. He and his crew had responded to the call and when they arrived on the scene, Sean learned it was his wife and two children that had perished. He has been carrying around this huge weight of guilt on his shoulders for the past two years because he was suppose to be with his family the day of the crash. Instead he was covering another shift at the fire station.

I love the character of Eve. She is my favorite female from this series. She’s a strong woman, which you have to be when working in a male dominated line of work. Until now, everyone except Sean has known that Eve has had feelings for Sean. Sean was too busy drowning in his own misery to even notice. Even though Eve kept her feelings to herself, it was clear to the other guys at the station how she felt about Sean just by the way she looked at him. There never seemed to be a right time for her to make a move; Sean at first had been a married man with children. Now Sean comes with major emotional baggage and his being a recovering alcoholic doesn’t make things any easier.Add in the fact that Sean is the Fire Captain of Station Five, and Eve’s superior, and well, you get a tricky situation.

I really like that the villain’s narrative was told in short snippets. I don’t like reading a lot from the villain’s POV, as I feel it takes away from the hero and heroine of the story, so this was good.

What I Didn’t Like: There was one love scene that was a bit…out there for me (for lack of a better words). One word: foil. It doesn’t belong anywhere in a love scene. I cringe just thinking about it.

Please correct me if I’m wrong but I believe Ride the Fire is the last book in this series and this saddens me. A new character was brought into Station Five’s A-Shift, which would enable another book to be added to this series, but from what I’ve read online I think the author might do a novella for this character instead of a full-length novel (if anything). This of course didn’t effect my review or opinion of Ride the Fire but I don’t like that it has come to an end (if my assumptions are indeed correct).

Overall Impression: It’s been days since I’ve finished reading this book and I’m still thinking about Sean, Eve and the guys at Station Five. Ride the Fire, along with the rest of the Firefighters of Station Five series, is the perfect blend of romance and suspense. Neither element overshadows the other. Jo Davis creates a great combination of romance, steamy love scenes with mystery and suspense mixed in. I was pulled right into the book and before I knew it, the last page was turned. I wasn’t ready to let go.

Reading tip - I had read Line of Fire (book 4) first, before any other book in this series, and that book was fine to read as a stand alone. However, I do not recommend reading Ride the Fire as a stand alone since bits and pieces of Sean’s story has been written into each book in this series. Sean’s story begins in book 1, Trial by Fire. And you continue to get his story along the way in the other books. I knew that before I could read Ride the Fire I would have to read the first 3 books in the series in order for the story to come full circle, so I did. So to truly appreciate Ride the Fire and Sean’s journey, I highly recommend and encourage you to read this series in order. Besides, you wouldn’t want to miss out on the rest of the boys, now would you.

 

The Book Vixen’s Rating:

*This review was originally posted on Fiction Vixen Book Reviews as a guest review.