Black
Diamond
Wilds of the Bayou, #2
by Susannah Sandlin
Date of
Publication: October 18th 2016
Publisher:
Montlake Romance
Cover
Artist: Michael Rehder
Genre:
Romantic Suspense
From The Book Junkie Reads . . . Black
Diamond (Wilds of the Bayou, #2) . . .
Hot, stick, moist heat of the Bayou
lays backdrop to the latest drama and mysterious thrill seeking refuge to this Louisiana
parish. The wildlife agent this time was Jena Sinclair. She has her hands full
with working to investigate the new drug on the sense that was causing strange,
yet terrifying side effects its users. The Bayou was home to many strange
things including this latest mystery.
Jena had been shot, attempted suicide
and was now faced with a new crazed drug flooding her community. This officer
had her hands full. Now add to her a reclusive man, Cole. He has what she
needs, information. He also has a past about as dark and illusive as her own.
The two work together and find more than just a killer.
Sandlin has given another thrilling
mysterious adventure in the bayou. The turns are steep the chase fast. This was
just what the doctor ordered when intense drama, morbid action, and thrilling
mystery was prescribed.
**This ARC was provided via NetGalley
in exchange for an honest review.**
Wilds
of the Bayou series:
Wild Man’s Curse – Wilds of the Bayou, #1 SEE REVIEW
Black Diamond – Wilds of the Bayou, #2
BLURB
For some people, the untamed beauty of
the bayou is a place to hide. For Louisiana wildlife agent Jena Sinclair, it’s
a place of refuge—one where she can almost forget the tragedy that scarred both
her skin and her soul. But when the remains of yet another fisherman turn up,
Jena realizes that Bayou Pointe-aux-Chenes is not safe for her…or anyone else.
The mysterious deaths aren’t her only
problem. A dangerous drug known as Black Diamond is circulating through Terrebonne
Parish, turning addicts into unpredictable sociopaths. Jena’s investigation
leads her to Cole Ryan—a handsome, wary recluse struggling with his own
troubled history—who knows more than he’s willing to admit. If they want to
stop the killer, Jena and Cole must step out of the shadows of their pasts and
learn to help each other…before the evils lurking in the bayou consume them
both.
Buy Links:
eBook 1, Wild Man’s Curse, on Sale Through
the End of October
Cole stood inside the
door, knowing she’d be there any second. She would knock, probably with a firm
rap to remind him who had the authority here, and it wasn’t him. She would
expect to come inside, and while he could deny her entrance without a warrant,
he wouldn’t. It would raise too much suspicion.
His fists clenched
and unclenched. Again. Again. The press and release of tension filtered out
some of the stiffness from his arms and shoulders. The woman was striking, her
wistful expression had resonated with him, and he had wanted to look at her.
He’d looked long and hard enough that she’d caught him standing in the doorway
like an idiot. Otherwise, he could’ve pretended to be gone and not answered his
door. Now, hiding wasn’t an option.
The last thing he needed in his life
was a woman. Especially a woman with a badge and a gun.
Though expected, the sharp knock made
his shoulders jerk upward, and his fingers clenched again into fists. Weapons
his body provided to protect itself, to protect him, to keep everyone away.
“Sir, I know you’re in there. I’m
Agent Sinclair of Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries.” Her voice was clear and
no-nonsense. He tried to place her accent—she wasn’t from Terrebonne Parish but
didn’t have a typical Southern accent either. “I want to talk to you about the
gator in front of your neighbor Doris’s house. It’ll only take a minute or
two.”
Damn. Now that he knew his neighbor’s
real name, the Wicked Witch was dead. Now she was Doris.
He took a deep breath, turned, and
opened the door an inch. Maybe two inches.
A hazel eye, heavy on the green, and
the bill of a dark-green baseball cap came into view, peering through the
crack. A strand of hair that trailed over her forehead from beneath the cap
shone like pure molten fire.
“You can open it all the way, you
know. I don’t bite. I’d like to come inside for a few minutes and talk, or you
can come out on the porch. Having a conversation isn’t optional, but where we
have it is. For now.”
Damn it. Cole had to admit he was
stuck and it was his own damned fault for standing in the doorway and watching
her for so long. He opened the door wide, dread giving way to curiosity when he
finally saw her face up close. She was beautiful but lightly scarred, more on
her cheeks than her forehead, so she’d probably been hit by flying glass rather
than having her head go through a windshield. Fairly recent too. The spots were
still pink, but they were scars and not wounds. Five or six months old, he’d
say. Eventually, they’d fade and, with her fair skin, would easily cover with
makeup. If she hadn’t been so close—not to mention his fixation on her face—he
wouldn’t have noticed them even now.
“Are you going to let me come inside,
or are you coming outside, or do I need to make it an official order?”
Buy Links:
eBook 1, Wild Man’s Curse, on Sale Through the End of
October
MY INTERVIEW WITH SUSANNAH
SANDLIN
How would you describe you style of writing
to someone that has never read your work?
Fast
and easy read. I come from a journalism background, so I like short paragraphs
and fast pacing. And my writing voice has humor in it, with often very damaged
characters who still are able to see the irony in their lives and situations.
Romance tends to build slowly and in ways that make sense for the
characters—not every character will fall for “insta-love.”
What mindset or routine do you feel the need
to set when preparing to write (in general whether you are working on a project
or just free writing)?
I am a
plotter—I think you almost have to be if you want to write multiple books a
year and also hold down a “day job.” So before I start writing on a new project
(and I get so immersed that I can only work on one book at a time), I spend
some time figuring out who my characters are, what drives them, where they need
to go, and how they need to get there. I don’t plan in such detail that they
can’t still surprise me during the writing, though.
Do you take your character prep to heart? Do
you nurture the growth of each character all the way through to the page? Do
you people watch to help with development? Or do you build upon your character
during story creation?
I want
to fall in love with my characters; unless I can fall in love with them, I
can’t make my readers fall in love with them. So I do spend a lot of time just
thinking about my characters and making them as three-dimensional in my head as
I can. I believe it was Ernest Hemingway who said that characters were like
icebergs—only a fraction of the character is seen at the story/surface level,
but there’s a lot of backstory/”ice” below the surface that only the author
knows. You need that deep backstory to bring your characters to life, even if
you never use all of it in the book. I do people-watch, especially how people
interact with each other.
Have you found yourself bonding with any
particular character? If so which one(s)?
I always
bond with at least one character from every single book. If I don’t, I know
that I need to go back and do some more character work. In the new book, BLACK
DIAMOND, I expected the hero, Cole, to be the one I fell for—and I did—but I
really bonded with the heroine, Jena. I gave her some of my own experiences,
which might be why I bonded with her. She’s struggling to regain trust in her
own judgment, and she’s trying to figure out why she holds herself back
sometimes instead of fully committing. Those are things I can identify with.
Do you have a character that you have been
working on that you can't wait to put to paper? Yes! Although the Wilds of the Bayou series
books can stand alone, they do have recurring characters. I had planned for the
first book (WILD MAN’S CURSE) to be senior wildlife agent Gentry Broussard’s
story and book two (BLACK DIAMOND) would be his partner, agent Jena Sinclair’s,
story. I had planned for the third book to focus on the wildlife agent team’s
youngest member, Mac Griffin, but another character, senior agent Paul Billiot,
captivated me from book one. I haven’t done all the work on Paul, who is Native
American, but he’s talking to me, telling me his secrets, and I can’t wait to
write his book. So that will have to be the next one. It’s not just me—readers
are asking for Paul’s book too!
Have you ever felt that there was something
inside of you that you couldn't control? If so what? If no what spurs you to
reach for the unexperienced?
I’m
more than a little bit of a control freak, and I am not happy in situations in
which I have no control. So book publishing is really pushing the envelope for
me. Novels are very personal things in a lot of ways, and you’re putting them
out there to be critiqued and judged—not to mention trying to sell your books.
Sales are another thing over which you have virtually no control. But being a
novelist is emotionally fulfilling and it lets me do things that I’d be
reluctant to do in real life--like catch alligators or chase down drug dealers
or cavort with vampires and undead pirates or dive into the North Atlantic to
find a lost relic of the Knights Templar. I let my characters do those things
for me!
Author Info
Suzanne
Johnson writing as Susannah Sandlin is the author of the award-winning Penton
Vampire Legacy paranormal romance series, including the 2013 Holt Medallion
Award-winning Absolution and Omega and Allegiance, which were nominated for the
RT Book Reviews Reviewers Choice Award in 2014 and 2015, respectively. She also
wrote The Collectors romantic suspense duology, including Lovely, Dark, and Deep,
2015 Holt Medallion winner and 2015 Booksellers Best Award winner. Her new
suspense series Wilds of the Bayou started in 2016 with the release of Wild
Man’s Curse and continues with Black Diamond. Johnson is the author of the
award-winning Sentinels of New Orleans urban fantasy series. A displaced New
Orleanian, she currently lives in Auburn, Alabama. Susannah loves SEC football,
fried gator on a stick, all things Cajun, and redneck reality TV.
Author Links:
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