The First Step

Didn't quite grab me. I appreciated learning about the dangerous job of river pilots and the coastal North Carolina setting (close to where I have vacationed every summer), but the romance between Reed and Justin never quite gelled for me. I wasn't carried along on their journey from mistrust to friends to lovers to HEA because I didn't feel the strong connection the author kept insisting they had. It felt like they moved through those stages because the page count demanded it, not because they had genuinely earned it.

The last 25% of the book was the best part, an action-packed finale as the two men faced nature's powerful wrath together. Wish I had liked this more, as Shira Anthony is a new-to-me author and this book was recommended to me by a reviewer I greatly respect, but it just didn't wow me.