New Jersey – Present Day

As a private consultant and expert in self-defense and criminology, as well as a whiz in the martial art of Krav Maga, former FBI agent, Sloane Burbank, does her best to be satisfied with her current career, but she really misses her work with the Bureau. However, an attack while arresting a suspect left her hand severely damaged, requiring three surgeries and a lengthy recovery period. Although Sloane cannot quite pull the trigger of a gun yet, her hard work during rehabilitation therapy has gone a long way toward strength training and pain management.

When a childhood friend’s mother asks for Sloane’s help in kicking the investigation back open to find Penny, Sloane’s friend, she is taken aback when she discovers that Penny went missing almost a year ago. The odds are greatly stacked against finding her friend alive, but Sloane will not rest until they find some kind of news, any news, of her whereabouts.

Former Army Ranger and current member of the FBI’s Asian Criminal Enterprise Task Force in New York, Derek Parker was the agent of record for the Penny Truman case. When new evidence surfaces and adds new insight into Penny’s disappearance, Derek is ordered to redirect his efforts. It should come as no shock that Sloane is waving the banner and at the forefront to redouble FBI and police efforts to search for Penny. Many would classify this as a cold case, but after careful consideration, a couple of solid leads point to other missing women in which the modus operandi matches up.

Seeing Sloane again almost every day causes a lot of damage to Derek’s libido. Their romantic relationship ended abruptly, and badly, when Sloane was forced to leave the FBI after her injury. It has been that long since he last saw her routinely, and things haven’t changed because he still wants her. But while Derek and Sloane are reacquainting themselves with each other, more women go missing, and they all seem to have some tie to Sloane. At the same time, Derek is drawn back into his own case with Asian Criminal Task Force investigating the gruesome murders of several prostitutes in Chinatown. It seems that crime, not time, waits for no one and things come to a screeching halt when the trail to a kidnapper goes stone cold. Although women are still disappearing in Sloane’s investigation and Asian call girls are dying under Derek’s watch, there seems to be no light at the end of the tunnel for either of these cases.

Tick tock…

Take two characters teeming with sexual frustration and tension, mix them up and throw them in one of the worst situations possible, and there you have Andrea Kane’s latest, TWISTED. The title is apt for a story that ebbs and flows, but really gathers up steam and charges full ahead once Sloane and Derek realize they’re working against some unseen time clock. With the beginning of each chapter, Ms. Kane treats her readers with a glimpse into the mind of the individual behind the kidnappings. It’s a disturbing look into the thoughts of a person who feels justified in what he -- or she -- is doing, and while creepy, I felt that it truly seasoned this otherwise straightforward romantic suspense novel. Not only does the author do all of her characters justice by really getting to know them as people, but by obviously doing quite a lot of research in law enforcement and the workings of the FBI to really give them a sense of self and dedication.

There are many secondary characters, too many to list here, but all lend their own credence to this fast-paced novel that’s rich in tension and pace. While some readers may be put off by the technical jargon throughout TWISTED, Ms. Kane has included a glossary to make translation a bit easier. It is details like this that really prove an author stands behind her story 100%.

Stay up late tonight with TWISTED and treat yourself to a romantic thriller that is sure to please…

Amy Cunningham