SMOKE SCREEN by Sandra Brown
Everybody loves a good mystery and Sandra Brown writes good mysteries. She also adds in a little bit of sex and a little bit of humor. This combination has stood her in good stead as she has created her career as a novelist. Her latest SMOKE SCREEN is a by the numbers continuation of this pattern, and as such it is a good read for Sandra Brown’s fans.
The heroine of this book is Britt Shelley, a television news reporter in Charleston, South Carolina. She wakes up one morning in the bed of Jay Burgess, a fireman who is recognized as a great hero. Britt has no memory of how she came to be there. Her last memories are of having dinner with Jay and going back to his apartment to talk.
To add horror to humiliation, Jay is dead. Now the world knows about Britt and where she woke up. Worse yet she can not come up with an alibi as she has complete memory loss. Eventually Britt becomes convinced that someone drugged her so that she would not remember and so that she could be framed for the murder.
Due to some bizarre circumstances Britt’s path crosses with that of Raley Gannon. He was a fire investigator until a similar event happened in his life. He woke up next to a woman who died of an overdose of drugs. He had no memory of the night and felt that someone had drugged him. He tried to argue this point but ended up being laughed at. He lost his job and his career.
Everything seems to go back to a fire at the jailhouse in Charleston where many people lost their lives. Jay Burgess was one of the heroes of that fire but it seems there was more to the story than has ever been revealed. When Jay contacted Britt he told her he wanted to give her a story that would cause a lot of shock and excitement.
The story goes through a lot of twists and turns as these two people try to prove their innocence and get to the bottom of the plot against them. There are additional threats made on their lives and plenty of close calls as the story progresses.
The problem with this plot is the events are just not realistic. The lucky turns of events that keep the two out of harm’s way are too contrived and too co-incidental. Nobody is that lucky time after time.
If you can disregard the reality factor the book is pretty good reading. Britt and Raley have a lot of chemistry between them and the love that begins to grow is understandable. Still the revelation of the “mastermind of evil” is predictable. I guessed the identity early on and I am not the most astute person when reading stories like this one.
Sandra Brown fans will eat up the story but I am not sure SMOKE SCREEN will bring her any new fans. This is a good read but not a great one.
SMOKE SCREEN is published by Simon and Schuster. It contains 400 pages and sells for $26.95.