Suzanne Brockman – Troubleshooters Series

I don’t know about you but I often read a series out of order, in fact with this series I started to read the most recent book (into the Fire, book 13) but found that there were just too many characters that I knew nothing about that I had to give up on the book.  I had never read any of Ms Brockmans books before but this one really intrigued me (a deaf heroine trying to help her murdered best friends husband prove his innocence) so I didn’t give up totally, i went back to halfway in the series and started to read. 

In fact I really think this is almost two series’s in one, books 1 – 6 are about one set of characters, and books 7-13 are about a second set of spin off characters.  In fact her style of writing changes as well.  In the first set of books there are two stories running parallel, the modern romance and a world war II story.  But from book 7 she stops the world war II stories and concentrates on the main romance story arc and the beginning or continuation of a secondary story arc.  Hence why it was so hard to read book 13 cold – the secondary story arc included people and situations I had no idea about (In fact the hero had a story arc in a previous book that was pivotal to this one).

After a bit of research I decided to skip books 1-6 and started at book 7, (although I do plan to go back soon and read books 1-6) as these are some really great romantic suspense books!

Troubleshooters is a series about an elite group of navy seals and an equally elite private security agency, that are linked through friendships and working relationships.  The men are all strong, and the women are just as strong but in a feminine way.  But what really caught my eye about this series is the fact that Ms Brockmann very capably deals with some very difficult topics.  Rape, murder, a deaf character,  gay characters (I loved the story arc of Jules and Robin, especially their wedding!) in fact Ms Brockmann is fearless in what she writes, and she writes it beautifully.

Her characters are allowed to develop over many books, thus giving them a depth that is often not seen in a romance, they don’t always fall in love straight away, in fact in some cases they take several stories to get it together, or to decide to never get it on (a bit like real life in fact) Don’t get me wrong these are romance novels, but they aren’t just love stories, they are books about people, people who grow and change, have awful things happen to them, or to people they care about that they then cant handle (max’s story is a fantastic example of this, and also of a story that spans many books)

This isn’t a series you can just read one book of, you really do need to read them in order (or at least from 1-6 or 7-present) If you like stories that really allow character development then I suggest you give this series a try!

Tazallie

1. The unsung hero
2. The defiant hero
3. Over the edge
4. Out of control
5. Into the night
6. Gone to far
7. Flashpoint
8. Hot target
9. Breaking point
10. Into the strorm
11. Force of nature
12. All trough the night
13. Into the fire
14. Dark of night (Spring 2009)

Check out Suzanne Brockmanns Site for a fantastic guide to the troubleshooters series

~ by Tazallie on September 21, 2008.