Menace by Laramie Briscoe
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

Laramie Briscoe’s Menace was a fun, fast read for me. A solid 4.5 star read! I haven’t read Briscoe before, but her Moonshine Task Force series has been something I have seen increasingly through social media. As a result, I signed up as a blogger to read and see what this new-to-me-author had to offer. I can’t say I was disappointed. I wasn’t. Like at all. I thoroughly enjoyed her writing and the book. Menace is the story of a single dad who is almost an empty nester, Mason. As his eighteen-year-old enters the final semester before he graduates from high school. Having a career he enjoys isn’t enough anymore. His son is leaving for college and Mason needs to find the next phase of his life. Then, Mason meets Karina, a beautiful woman who more than intrigues him. Seeing a future available that he never imagined before, Mason, his son Caleb and Karina begin a journey that could lead to so much more. A mother for Caleb, a wife and partner for Mason…only someone is continuing to distribute moonshine to the teens of the town and they are running out of time before things turn deadly.

Menace is the fifth book in a series and obviously, some of the events in this book had been introduced previously. Yet Laramie Briscoe did an excellent job of explaining them without over burdening the story with the events of the past. If you are a first-time reader, you shouldn’t be discouraged from reading the series out of order. I purchased all the books and have begun to read them out of order. I am not having any problems at this point. The story is told through duel perspectives which I love. The characters are very enjoyable. I swooned over Mason big time. I saw that Caleb will be getting a book as well…which is extremely exciting since his presence in the series has really developed him and made you anxious for more Caleb. I loved the father-son dynamics but when Caleb’s relationship with Rina advanced? That made me just melt. As a woman with three sons, I really loved seeing the budding relationship become that of a mother/son.

Then we have the relationship between Mason and Rina. It was positively combustible! Like seriously, Laramie Briscoe writes SMOKING hot sexy times. A single date, an immediate connection and a homerun before the night ends leads the pair to grab hold to the possibilities of more than the lonely existence they had been living separately. I only struggled with one aspect of the relationship between Mason and Rina. The story kind of happens at warp speed in terms of romance. The actual timeline is only over the course of maybe 8 to 9 months, but Mason has Rina moving in about a month after they first meet. That for me was a hard sell. I think that while Laramie made the story work well, it isn’t something we would necessarily see IRL. However, I want to be clear here – I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I am not knocking the story, or the author’s implementation of the story, in any way. I read romance because I want to see the evolution of a relationship, the character interaction, and I want a HEA. Obviously, that means sometimes things are different then we might experience IRL.

I am sure that this story will appeal to a large following of the romance genre. It is the story of an ex-military man turned cop who has raised his son on his own. He is alpha in the best ways and he falls hard for his son’s teacher. It allows readers of the previous books in the series to catchup with the characters they already know and love. The plot development has obviously evolved over the course of several books, but not in a way that readers should find daunting. Also, while some of the issues introduced are emotionally rough, they are handled well – in a way that the keeps the book lighter and doesn’t imply the darker elements as you might expect. You’ll be able to pick this up, read and enjoy. Its one I would definitely recommend as a solid 4.5 star read.

PURCHASE LINKS

US: http://amzn.to/2s20pJw
UK: http://amzn.to/2nKhkv0
CA: http://amzn.to/2E1guAJ
AU: http://amzn.to/2nKibvI

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