Review: I like - Alot, Bring on the second book
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 07 9, 2010
The Sainte family is unlike any other family you will ever meet, not only are they a family with something special about them  all - but they are ingenious and resilient enough to make themselves into a business.They are into the business of being in the right place at the right time, getting information as discreetly as they can while doing it as legally as possible or as close to the edge as they dare go without calling attention to themselves.While they would probably be good at their jobs, they are actually a cut above the rest because of their enhance physical and psychic abilities. TO HUNT A SAINTE start off with us meeting Alexandra and her brother Cole, who just happen to be breaking into the office of a man they suspect is up to some rather nasty business.They are not there just on a hunch, but because Alexandra had more or less dared her brother into getting a jump start on a case they are working on for Buchanan Investigations. Using every thing literally at their finger tips to gain entry - Alexandra with her telekinetic powers and  Cole with something as close to  mind reading as you can get - easily makes their entry and are out in a flash.In the shadows Hunter Greye watches - and he is not liking what he is seeing, because if his gut instinct is right not only have the Sainte's and Buchanan Investigations stepped into his investigation, but they would have probably brought with them a whole lot of something that he and his colleagues know nothing about.Hunter works for a rival investigative company - Westlake Enterprises and while they have their own set of secrets and lies they also operate under the thumb of the government, which is a positive in some respect but where Buchanan Investigations more or less does their own thing - they have to toe the line or be sure and careful of whose toe they thread on.Hunter and Alexandra eventually meets, but not under ideal circumstance and they are literally forced to not only work together, but make it look good as several young women lives depend on them cracking the case they are working on.Working together is not even the hard part of the deal, trying to keep their attraction from each other as well as their nosey interfering family and colleagues prove to to be harder than they both imagined. Hunter wants Alexandra and the feeling is totally mutually, but someone else has his eyes on her and he wants her at all cost and above all else.It's game on for Hunter and the team and Hunter aims to win because Alexandra with all her kookiness was his.TO HUNT A SAINTE is actually more suspense than romance and because of that I really enjoyed this book. The plotline is really easy to follow, there was no convoluted issues of trying to decipher codes or trying to read unknown emotion, this was just the tale of a bad man doing rather nasty nefarious things and the good guys trying their damnest to shut him down.Sounds simply well it's wasn't.Ms. Harte does a pretty decent job with the fine print. As a first book I got the wordy chunk of info about the characters and the companies they work for, add into that some family tension and some sarcastic humour and I was good.Meeting Alexandra and Hunter was a real treat, from the first moment you could actually feel the tension in the air when they themselves meet. All Alexandra really wants is a chance to prove to her family that she can work in the field, use her skills well and take responsibility for her action - but they were not having it, she was for all intend and purpose the baby of the family irrespective of her telekinetic skills.Hunter on the other hand is just that a hunter and he takes no prisoner. From the moment he spied Alexandra she called to something in him that he had not thought to look at in years - the need to care for someone else, the need to call someone his own.They make a good pair and despite the fact they both works for rivalling companies that are trying to keep it's secrets in-house. One thing the both side does have in common is their thirst for justice and seeing the job through.When their bosses decides to pool their resources and go after the bad guy as a team, Hunter's attraction to Alexander is put under some strain as they are forced to work together and thus hasten that first special stage of a relationship. This I didn't like so much as I love the tease and the getting to know you stage of a relationship - but as the focus of this book was on the big picture of good overcoming evil  - I wasn't too put out about how fast they got together.The first part of the book is quite involved as Ms Harte does build up on the background of each company and laid out some of the ground work on each of the key players involved in the case. This actually worked for me as once you get to about a third in - she does concentrate on the ferreting out of a very bad man.I love a book that gives even the bad guy page time and Ms. Harte really did the business with these baddies. She gave me their thoughts, their actions and opened up their world and the master plan that they were working toward to me. Some of that part of the book while not graphic in details is not for the squeamish and if you have a love for thriller and some decently carved out nasty with your romance you will like this one.The individual skills of the cast was nicely introduced into the plot I thought and this book does not cross into the world of paranormal - the "skills" the team had were your everyday fare and it was nice to get back to something basic like being psychic or having Telekinetic skills.My one let down in the book and this is just me really, I felt the resolution was too easy. I wanted blood on the walls and drawn out torture - as I said it was just me. However, the build up to that point in the book was not only tension filled but really something I was looking forward to - I thought it just went too smoothly and it was over before the bad guy got his just deserve.Despite Ms. Harte not satisfying my blood lust, with an array of support cast that had me laughing out loud a time or two I really enjoyed this book. The pace was quick and not clouded by unnecessary details. As a first book, I do like where Ms Harte  left me - the bad got his, Hunter got the girl and all the other concerns are left for other members of the team to fight another day.