Gwen’s review of Unlawful Contact by Pamela Clare
Contemporary romantic suspense released by Berkley on 1 Apr 08

Picture this, if you will: successful investigative reporter is kidnapped by an escaped lifer.  He hauls her literally thru a police cordon, off into the mountains, to a cabin he knows from his past.  She doesn’t know who he is, except he’s related to a drug addicted young mother she knows – an addict who has disappeared.  All she knows of him is he seems violent, he’s kidnapped her, and she may never be seen alive again.  And so starts a love story…

Holy crap, you say!  So did I!

First, let me set the stage for this review.  I’m listening to Pink Floyd’s Welcome to the Machine (see the “Duck Sauce Theater” in the lower left of the main TGTBTU page).  Seemed appropriate for the wringer our hero and heroine go thru and for one of the basic elements of this book – the prison experience.

Sophie and Marc are fated to be together.  They were attracted to each other in high school.  An attraction they didn’t act on until the day before he leaves for the Army.  They think about each other for years after that beautiful, fateful night.  The way they come back together was written very naturally and, despite the bizarre confluence of events, it was very believable.

And that is probably a good summary for the rest of the book – it was viscerally believable.  It was one of those books where I reached that “reading nirvana” – that place where I’m not even aware of turning the pages and I’m surprised when anyone speaks to me in real life.  I’m so “in the moment” that it’s like I’m hypnotized.  I love, love, love it when a book is that good.

This book is the whole package:  good love story, good action, good characters, good setting, and, most importantly, good writing.  Clare has created a unique thing – a bubble in time that is populated by a compelling story about likable characters with some edge-of-your-seat suspense.  That she also shines a little-used light on the plight of female inmates of our prison systems brings another genuine note to this very good book.

Being a romance, it’s no surprise that the H/H get a happily ever after.  What is a surprise was how Clare did it.  I won’t spoil it for you, but the ending is very gratifying to my “keep it real” genes and still satisfied my “HEA” desires.

I recommend this book to suspense fiction fans, romantic suspense fans, and fans of Pamela Clare.  You won’t regret the time and money spent.  Spread the word – there’s a new warden in town and her name is Pamela Clare.

Grade: A

From the back cover:

     Taken hostage by a convicted murderer while reporting at a prison, Sophie Alton has no idea that the man holding the gun to her head is the bad boy who was her first love in high school. Condemned to life without parole, Marc Hunter finds himself with no choice but to break out of prison after his younger sister disappears with her baby.

     Though he regrets what he has to put Sophie through, he can’t let anything get in the way of his stopping the corrupt officials who are set on destroying what’s left of his family. But being near Sophie rekindles memories for both of them. As the passion between them heats up, so does the conspiracy to put both of them in their graves.

     Read an excerpt.