Narrated by Aiden Snow
This audiobook consists of instalments one and two in Caitlyn O’Leary’s Black Dawn series of romantic suspense stories featuring the Black Dawn Navy SEAL team. I’m a fan of the genre and am always on the lookout for new titles to listen to, plus Aiden Snow is a very experienced narrator, so I thought I’d give these stories a try. In the end, I found Her Devoted Hero to be the more enjoyable of the two; the story was more interesting and the romance a little better developed, while Her Steadfast Hero suffered from what I call “novella-itis” in that it felt rushed and everything – plot, characterisation and romance –were very superficial.
Her Steadfast Hero
Military Police Investigator Captain David Sloane is sent to the small island of Las Flores (I’m guessing it’s off the coast of central or south America) in order to investigate the wrongful imprisonment of two army personnel. But before he can meet with them, an earthquake hits and all hell breaks loose. In the ensuing chaos, over fifty dangerous criminals escape from the island’s prison and the island’s Governor puts David in charge of apprehending the escapees.
When a team from Doctors Without Borders arrives a couple of days later, David is surprised to see Sarah Kyle, a nurse with whom he’d gone on a few dates around four and a half years earlier. The fact that he can remember exactly how many years, months and days it’s been since they last saw each other is clearly meant to signal that Sarah is important to him, and after some initial awkwardness, they quickly reconnect and deal with the issues that initially separated them.
There are a couple of action sequences, the first of which introduces the Black Dawn SEAL team (the members of which will feature in future books in the series), but unfortunately, Her Steadfast Hero fails in terms of both romance and suspense. There’s a lot of telling rather than showing, the characters and situations are under-developed, there’s some cringeworthy dialogue and there’s no relationship development or romantic chemistry between the leads. There’s a flashback to four years earlier – when David and Sarah had just started dating – during which they share a very uninspired sex-scene, and then we jump back into the present and they pretty much pick up where they left off.
Her Devoted Hero
This story features Dex Evans, Black Dawn’s computer specialist who, shortly before the team is sent on their latest mission, was the victim of a huge prank by one of his team-mates, who set up a profile for Dex on a dating site and sent match requests to over two hundred women. Dex has almost finished sending apologies to the women, but there’s one he hasn’t sent yet, to a woman whose screen name is SNMP, which she says stands for “So Not Mary Poppins”. Her response to Dex’s initial contact message is a mixture of snarky and endearing, and Dex can’t find it in him to send her the same “thanks but no thanks” email he’s sent to all the others. He responds, SNMP writes back, and they find themselves corresponding with each other via email.
SNMP is actually Kenna Wright, the single mother of a fifteen-year-old son. Kenna works two jobs to make ends meet; she’s an oncology nurse and also PA to former movie star Rosalie Randall and has some serious self-esteem issues thanks to her ex (her son’s father) who really did a number on her. She only responds to Dex’s email because she’s pretty sure he won’t write back, so when he does, she’s inclined to bolt. Kenna can’t deny that he’s the first man she’s found attractive in a long while, but when she gets cold feet and deletes her profile on the dating site, she’s astonished when Rosalie fesses up to having had her grandson purchase the company that owns the site with a view to finding Kenna some suitable matches. (Yes, really). I admit I’m not sure why Kenna didn’t read her the riot act about invading her privacy, but instead of being furious, she’s merely “incredulous”.
Having found out a few basic details about Kenna before she deleted her profile, Dex is delighted to receive an email from Rosalie inviting him to a meeting about the foundation for disadvantaged youth she’s setting up. Dex’s interest in the project is genuine (he’s a Big Brother) but, as he puts it, meeting Kenna is the “cherry on top”. He recognises Kenna’s skittishness and her need to go slow and gradually convinces her to give him a chance; they start getting to know each other better and things are going well, but when one of Kenna’s co-workers at the hospital is murdered – and the police suspect it may be linked somehow to the dating site – Dex is – of course – prepared to do whatever it takes to keep Kenna safe.
Although I found Her Devoted Hero held my attention more than Her Steadfast Hero, it was a case of its being the best of a bad lot. The story here falls into three sections that don’t really hang together particularly well. At the beginning, Dex and his team are sent on a mission to Egypt to rescue the family of an American diplomat, then we move to the romance with Kendra and finally to the mystery plot. I kept waiting for something to do with the rescue mission to turn out to be related to the mystery plot, but Egypt was never mentioned again. (I can only assume it was included simply to introduce the members of Black Dawn). Kenna and Dex are likeable characters, and I enjoyed her relationship with her son Austin and the way he interacted with Dex, but Kenna’s insistence on trying to keep Dex at arm’s length because she thinks he can’t really be interested in her, and the way she keeps insisting that there’s nothing long-term in the offing is rather overdone and got annoying very quickly. We see almost nothing of her at her nursing job, which made little sense to me, given how busy nurses are and how hard they work! When the murder plot kicks in, Dex goes all caveman-protector, even though he and Kenna have only been on a couple of dates, and he steamrollers the police investigation and takes over, which was, frankly, ridiculous.
Aiden Snow is a very experienced performer who records extensively in the romance genre, so I knew I was in a safe pair of hands on the narration front at least. His deep, rich tones are very easy on the ear, his pacing is good and he differentiates effectively between all the characters in both books. The opening of Her Devoted Hero features all the members of Black Dawn, and Mr. Snow provides different vocal characterisations for all of them. And even though he has a very deep voice, he’s able to portray female characters convincingly and does a very good job voicing the handful of children who appear in both stories, especially Kenna’s teenaged son. Most of the secondary characters in Her Steadfast Hero are given Spanish accents which sounded accurate to my ear and which are maintained consistently throughout.
Ultimately, the narration in both stories emerged the winner; neither tale was especially memorable, the characterisation was little more than two-dimensional and there were so many plot holes and inconsistencies that I’m not motivated to continue with the Black Dawn series.
Caz
Buy Her Steadfast Hero/Her Devoted Hero by Caitlin O'Leary on Amazon
