Title : Still Air
Author : Freya Barker
Series : Portland ME #4
Release date : 05 Dec 2016
Rating : 4 Stars
Blurb : Deprival haunted her…Regret troubled her… Silence left her detached… A life in the service of others is both penance and a blessing. She soothes her personal hell by pulling victims from theirs, helping them on their path to survival; never finding her own.When a crippling blow finally evaporates her last hope, the temptation to give up is strong. Still, she can’t find it in her to turn her back on those who need her: the innocent, whose rescue is her perpetual goal. He was blind, but now he sees how his family has sifted through his fingers. The reality hits hard when his son becomes a stranger, slipping deeper into transgression. Concern has him call on the one person he fears will see his own failures all too clearly. A woman he’s kept his distance from for his own protection.What appeared to be an incompatible pairing, turns out the unyielding bond needed to heal them all.
Review : As with all her previous books in that series “Still Air” by Freya Barker starts with the raw and honest reality of the leading characters. We have known Dino and Pam as side characters in the previous books, so it is like meeting old friends. But while why know them – we do not really KNOW them.
So the dark and sad opening chapters of the book show a side of the character that I would not have expected before, yet I know better from reading the previous books.
Pam always seemed so strong in the previous books but now she shows us her much softer side and we get to hear her story and the reasons why she has been hiding her feelings. She is hiding behind her need to help others and she is desperate to hide from Dino, because he sees too much.
Dino feels as if everything that is dear and important to him is slipping through his fingers. And just as everything looks dark there is Pam … doing what she does best … help others…and in this case him.
Yet he cannot help but sense something under the surface of this woman and while the story unfolds both characters are drawn to each other.
Freya Barker writes real characters with real flaws. Her stories might be a little darker than others but they feel honest and I can only recommend this series to readers that like raw, honest and real in their books.
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