Chasing Fire

Author: Nora Roberts
Publisher: Putnam

There's little as thrilling as firefighting-at least to Rowan Tripp. The Missoula smoke jumpers are in Rowan's blood: her father is a legend. She's been fighting fires since her eighteenth birthday. At this point, returning to the wilds of Montana for the season feels like coming home-even with reminders of the partner she lost last season still lingering.

Fortunately, this year's rookie crop is one of the strongest ever-and Gulliver Curry's one of the best. He's also a walking contradiction, a hotshot firefighter with a big vocabulary and a winter job at a kids' arcade.

Everything is thrown off balance when a dark presence lashes out against Rowan, looking to blame someone for last year's tragedy. Rowan knows she can't complicate things with Gull-any distractions in the air or on the ground could mean the end-but if she doesn't find someone she can lean on, she may not make it through the summer. . . .

Nora does it again. Chasing Fire has all of the elements I love about her books. Great chemistry between the lead characters, interesting secondary characters, and a good mystery to round it out. Coming in at 472 pages, there is a lot packed into this book. You can tell that Ms. Roberts did a lot of research about the Fire Jumpers. After reading Chasing Fire, I have a whole new respect for the men and women who fight forest fires. You have to be very gutsy to do that job! The fire scenes were exciting and kept me on my toes. As for the mystery, I had an idea of who it might be causing all of the problems, but I wasn't really 100% sure until the reveal.

Rowan and Gulliver are very well fleshed out characters. Both are strong people and compliment each other well. I really believed their relationship and fall into love. There is another secondary romance between Rowan's father, Lucas, and his jump student, Ella, that is so sweet and endearing it made my heart melt. Along with the romantic relationships, I enjoyed the camaraderie between the firefighters.

I should note that I listened to the audio version and the narrator did a great job. I definitely recommend this latest by Ms. Roberts. You are in for a wild ride!

--Kari