|
To the Edge (The Bodyguards, Book 1) | 
| Author: Cindy Gerard
Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks
Category: Book
List Price: $6.99
Buy New: $3.19
You Save: $3.80 (54%)
New (25) Used (30) Collectible (5) from $2.00
Rating:  35 reviews
Sales Rank: 9289
Media: Mass Market Paperback
Pages: 352
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 6.5 x 4.2 x 1.1
ISBN: 031299091X
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9780312990916
ASIN: 031299091X
Publication Date: May 3, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
| |
| Also Available In:
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
The daughter of a wealthy businessman, Jillian Kincaid grew up with bodyguards shadowing her every move-and she hated it. Now a TV anchorwoman, she refuses to let another hired thug follow her around. Not even when she begins to receive terrifying death threats. Not even when the bodyguard is the darkly seductive Nolan Garrett...
Trained in Special Ops, bodyguard Nolan Garrett has been hired by Jillian's father to keep her out of danger. But it's clear from the start that Jillian isn't going to make his job easy. Far from the spoiled princess he expected, Jillian is tough, independent, and totally sexy. And she's fighting him every step of the way.
As Jillian's stalker raises the stakes, Nolan must keep her close if he wants to keep her alive. But being so close can only turn up the heat that's been simmering between them-a heat that could explode into passion at any moment...
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 30 more reviews...
 Couldn't finish May 29, 2009
a Reader (Boston, USA)
CG came highly recommended. I'm having a hard time figuring out why.
The hero Nolan starts out not coping with life, has one impressive fight but is otherwise incompetent at his job, erratically mean to the heroine, and TSTL. Because it's all about him, he goes back to his same lack of coping by getting drunk for days when he could be out being useful to his friends, family or object of affection. But no. Here's a hint: It's ok to start out a hero as a morose drunk only if he grows up, grows a pair, and gets over it by the end. I was left feeling sure that he would revert at the next minor crisis, which is not what I want for my heroine.
The heroine Jillian is pretty likeable actually: friendly, hardworking, focuses on the positives, and uses her rising tide to lift all boats rather than crush them in her wake. That said, while she has fewer TSTL moments than the hero she still has too many and a distressing tendency to believe what her intuition tells her rather than what Nolan's semi-abusive actions tell her. I wasn't convinced there was anything going on but her talking herself into loving the only semi-available guy in close proximity. That, and how can an award winning investigative journalist not be able to find someone at their _last_known_address_ after a week of searching?
The antagonist was a total let down. Not only didn't that character make sense to me, but I didn't care if it was that character. It didn't lead to anything useful but a brief moment where the heroine recovered some pride in her distant mother. This moment was insufficient justification for the bizzare and boring choice.
Plotwise... shortly before we find out whodunit, I switched to only reading for the train wreck factor because I couldn't take the wrongness of the actions anymore. I know more about bodyguarding from watching the secret service on TV than this guy seems to. And shortly after the train wreck plot, there's a train. What??? I don't think the author has ever seen a train move before or she would know that if a giant freight train was reversing direction - something it would never do outside a station except in an emergency - it would take so long and go so slowly a parade could walk between the cars to the other side. There would be no need to carefully time anything, especially if one were in good shape and motivated to get to the other side.
The romance. Was there one? There was a fun dance scene. There was one fun overnight. There were a few steamy glances. And Nolan turned on Jillian at the immediate conclusion of every single event, going distant and unreachable "for her own good" and visibly and knowingly hurting her more in the process. After a while, his about face was not only predictable but tiring. He saw that things went south and did the same wrong thing time after time. He never tried talking about his reasons, or working things through with her, or any minor variation. While we as readers "know" he means well and and we know that Jillian "accurately sees him for who he is inside" from very few clues, if I were watching it as a movie, I'd scream at her to get away from the abusive freak. The development was almost all in their heads, not in their communication, and the introspection didn't sell it to me. They remained "strangers with chemistry" to the end with only the one big night followed by enough disappointing behavior to poison it.
To sum up: started off with potential, didn't live up to it.
The prose is mostly fine as is a lot of the dialogue and the initial characterization, hence two stars instead of one. I did not see any character growth. TSTL Martyr-hero has bad coping skills and no bodyguarding skills to speak of which is bad when he's supposedly a bodyguard. Heroine's romantic motivations were not believeable, and she was often stubborn in ways that put her life at risk to no purpose. The action resolution left me not liking the people used as red-herrings as much as I would want to and I didn't care about the antagonist in any way. The big action sequence was wrecktacular then the denouement so boring and so introspective when it should have been all extroversion that I just stopped caring and stopped reading. I will never know what's on the last 10 pages or in her next book even though I already own it.
 Great suspense; could do with less sex and more ROMANCE May 18, 2009
Peabody823 (IL USA)
It lost a star due to the simple fact that it was packed with unnecessary sex. It's called ROMANTIC suspense, not sexual suspense; the two actually are different despite what many authors seem to suggest. Ignore that though and it was a highly intriguing book that kept me guessing and had real, lovable characters. Just wish there had been a PG-13 version instead.
 Great Read September 24, 2008
kittens2211 (AL)
I loved the passion in this book from the first time that Nolan meets Jillian.........just love him...
Great, fast read, believable characters August 3, 2008
Ophelia Mourns (Baltimore, MD)
If the rest of the books in the series are written as well as this one, I'm looking forward to reading them all. Books like these follow a fairly standard template -- brooding alpha male comes to the rescue of woman in peril. Perils ensue but in the end they walk off into the twilight together. When you know the basic ending before you even read the first page, it makes it doubly important that the danger scenario that drives the story be well written and well paced, that it keeps the reader's interest. You want to be invested in the characters and immersed in the story. Gerard accomplishes both in this first bodyguards book. I'm looking forward to reading the rest.
To the Edge July 19, 2008
SReMarie (the 'ville)
I enjoyed this book. I thought the characters were fairly well developed and I loved how Gerard made the main male character, Nolan so human. In my opinion many suspense/romance authors make the hero so tough and manly with no room for emotion except for the heroine usually. Nolan was so full of emotion before he met Jillian (the heroine) that he has to drown it out with a bottle of scotch. And Jillian is a little less developed but she's still understandable as well especially once you read the scene involving her mother. And I liked that she was the one to demand the relationship take place. The plot was good too, I didn't pick out the true villain until the showdown actually took place which is nice since it's sometimes really obvious. Also, Nolan's family business is personal security which is now he becomes Jillian's bodyguard. It also not so subtlety sets the stage for sequels for his brothers and sister but they seem interesting with all their own secrets. The romance area of the book is pretty satisfying though it mostly involves Nolan denying that he wants to be with Jillian. Like I already wrote, Jillian is the one that takes most of the initiative but then again thats not always a bad thing. Gerard makes you wait for the love scene but it was pretty steamy. The only problem I really had with the book was at the end Gerard tries to change of some of characters' character, like Jillian's mother and father; suddenly they have a whole new side/personality and we're supposed to feel sympathetic towards them? No. Overall though everything kind of works together to make for a good read.
Anyways, I would most definitely recommend this book and in fact I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the series..they're sure to be just as satisfying!
|
|
|
Proud member of the Celebrity Pro Network. Make sure you check out these other great JimmyKat network sites:
Lyrics Database
Celebrity Blog
Celebrity Thing
Celebrity PC
Latest Celebrity Photos
Web Portal
Travel Photos
Quotes
Flash Games
|
Is there a better
price available?
Find out:
|
|
|
|
