This is our first intentional entry in a little project we're doing - friend of the podcast Steve Ammidown posted this fascinating spread with a list of all the books Melinda Helfer, a Romantic Times editor, awarded five hearts in a review. Sixteen books out of ten thousand! Well, it turns out we'd already done two of them - Lightning that Lingers and The Windflower, both by Sharon and Todd Curtis (sometimes writing as Laura London.) Go check out those episodes, they're fantastic books! So every now and then going forward we're going to do one of these five heart books.

This is a mercenary book, but it's surprisingly gentle - there's that hostage situation, but nobody is seriously hurt and it doesn't feel incredibly perilous. There's later a bit of a threatening situation but it is also pretty low key. The author makes up some fake South American rebels but goes to real Northern Ireland in 1987, bold move! This is a delightful romantic suspense book for its time period.