Dane Whitelaw knows something about Sheila Warren that no one else does. Dane knows Sheila's dead.
The private investigator found a photo under his door--a picture of Sheila, strangled with his tie and posed on the beach of his private island in the Florida keys. The crime appears to be the handiwork of a serial killer currently terrorizing the Miami area. Now Dane knows he is being set up to take the fall for the killings. He just doesn't know why.
When Kelsey Cunningham's best friend goes missing, she confronts the one person she thinks will have information--Dane, Sheila's former lover and a man from Kelsey's own past. Kelsey follows Sheila's tracks into a dangerous world of sex, violence and drugs, with Dane right behind her. But the tentative trust between them shatters when Sheila's body is discovered--and Kelsey recognizes Dane's tie.
Now Kelsey doesn't dare trust anyone. Especially a man she can no longer deny she has always loved. Because here on...
New York Times and USA Today best-selling author Heather Graham majored in theater arts at the University of South Florida. After a stint of several years in dinner theater, back-up vocals, and bartending, she stayed home after the birth of her third child and began to write, working on short horror stories and romances. After some trial and error, she sold her first book, WHEN NEXT WE LOVE, in 1982 and since then, she has written over one hundred novels and novellas including category, romantic suspense, historical romance, vampire fiction, time travel, occult, and Christmas holiday fare. She wrote the launch books for the Dell's Ecstasy Supreme line, Silhouette's Shadows, and for Harlequin's mainstream fiction imprint, Mira Books.
Heather was a founding member of the Florida Romance Writers chapter of RWA and, since 1999, has hosted the Romantic Times Vampire Ball, with all revenues going directly to children's charity.
She is pleased to have been published in approximately twenty languages, and to have been honored with awards frorn Waldenbooks. B. Dalton, Georgia Romance Writers, Affaire de Coeur, Romantic Times, and more. She has had books selected for the Doubleday Book Club and the Literary Guild, and has been quoted, interviewed, or featured in such publications as The Nation, Redbook, People, and USA Today and appeared on many newscasts including local television and Entertainment Tonight.
Heather loves travel and anything have to do with the water, and is a certitified scuba diver. Married since high school graduation and the mother of five, her greatest love in life remains her family, but she also believes her career has been an incredible gift, and she is grateful every day to be doing something that she loves so very much for a living.
Once I start a book I have to finish it. I barely made it through this one. It was like reading a middle school student’s English assignment. The dialogue was childish and cliched. I’ve never been happier to finish a book.
Where to start?? it was slow...slloooooooooooowwwwwwwwww, and annoying.
I was split o0n the main characters. Kelsey was annoying...ANNOYING AS HELL. I wanted to reach into the page and slap her. We get it..you're pissed. It just felt like the whole "I'm angry over the past and I am going to pout like a child" thing went on to long.
I did like Dane though. Typical leading male for this kind of book, but I liked him.
and while I wasn't shocked at who the Killer(s) was/were.....It was not who I thought it was halfway through the book.
Other than that, it was just kind of slow and repetitive. A little more law & order and a little less "let's delve into our anger and feelings" would have been nice.
OH!!! SPOILER (kinda) and at the end to find out that Kelsey's mom is preggers. WHAT!! That was just annoying and stupid. She's in her 50's...it was just useless. I did NOT approve.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Hurricane Bay is a great, relaxing read about a group of friends who grew up together in the Florida Keys. Until something creepy intrudes on their paradise.
Kelsey Cunningham gets a call from Sheila Warren asking cryptically for help. When Kelsey arrives in Hurricane Bay, Sheila is nowhere to be found and Kelsey is flabbergasted at what appears to be her friends lackadaisical attitude.
Dane Whitelaw, a formerly close friend, has come back to Hurricane Bay and is running a Private Investigation office. But Kelsey is infuriated by his apparent "beach bum" stance and insults him.
Things are off to a horrible start and just keep getting worse as Kelsey pushes to locate Sheila and Dane tries to keep her safe. Many ugly secrets are revealed and past history brought back to light.
I loved how the plot thickened until it was almost impossible to figure out who was at fault. A great keep 'em guessing novel. This one is well worth the read.
Stars: 3 / 5 Recommendation: A good book to pick on those sunny days when your mind wants some interesting mystery to solve and at the same have the feeling of romance whirling through it.
Hurricane Bay is a stand-alone by Heather Graham published in 2002. The central plot revolves around Private Investigator Dale Whitelaw and his childhood friend Kelsey Cunningham who team up together to find out what happened to their missing friend Sheila Warren
Dale Whitelaw discovers that someone has kidnapped and murdered his former lover Sheila Warren and is framing him for the same. Kelsey Cunningham, best friend of Sheila, comes to town to Key Largo to meet her friend Sheila only to find her missing. She launches her own investigation and asking questions around. Everyone seems to think that Sheila would come back just like always after disappearing for a few weeks. And Dane wants to speed his investigation faster and find who is framing him lest she finds the framed truth and he gets convicted. Thus follows the cat and mouse chase for both Dale and Kelsey to find the truth and about what happened to Sheila.
A seemingly interesting meeting of childhood friends who make it a sort of reunion turns into a missing persons / murder investigation. Each of them have their share of baggage that they try to either forget or hide it from others to spend a few days in pure fun. The entire scenario set by Heather Graham reminded me of my meeting with my childhood friends. However the addition of murder added a chill at the base of my spine while reading the plot.
I have read very few books that are set in the state of Florida. So the location had made it interesting for me in the plot considering I was an avid watcher of CSI: Miami and reruns of Miami Vice.
Although Dale and Kelsey form the lead characters and their friends form the much needed supporting roles, the plot really centers on Sheila. Every page we turn, or every conversation we read or every scene set by Heather Graham revolves around Sheila making her the central character. She has but a live action role in the first chapter of the book and the rest of the chapters she is just a background role, more reflected on from a third person's perspective.
Although the plot is strong with excellent placement of characters, there is a lot of repeating para phrasing; more of repeat conversations to keep explaining the same again and again as a new character enters the scene. Perhaps that is what happens when there are many people involved. It was getting tiring to read that repeat stuff but all in all the plot is strong and keeps the reader interested.
Another thing that bothered me about the plot was that the character Kelsey refuses to believe anything Dale says about his relationship with Sheila but readily accepts everything anyone says about it. And yet she is the one who initiates a relationship with him. It was not clear when she started trusting him in the plot but if I was Dale it would be really hard for me to forgive someone who blames me. But again Dale is man so perhaps he was thinking from his brain below the belt..he he.
Being the plot set in Key Largo and Hurricane Bay, I did expect Heather Graham to include the weather elements into her plot; more precisely hurricanes. True to that she brings in history of Hurricane Andrew and current Hurricane Hannah that was going to attack the area in 2002.
All in all another decent suspense thriller without chilling your bones too much and the same time keeping you entertained.
Spoiler Alerts:
1) Plot Reveals: a. The group of friends all tied to Sheila other than Dale and Kelsey are: Larry Miller - Sheila's ex-husband; Nate Curry- owner of Sea Shanty and Kelsey's ex-husband; Cindy Greeley; Jorge Marti; b. Heather Graham brings Dale's past in St. Augustine very frequently which made me think that perhaps that was part of some other book of hers that had more of Dale Whitelaw. But to my disappointment or pleasure she reveals his past in this very same book. I guess I am very used to reading sequels or series of books that I look for clues that might hint towards a previous book or a future book. c. Heather Graham has her character Dale musing about being as rich as Croesus. And I wondered who that was cause I couldn’t attest the name to any famous millionaire or billionaire of recent times. Then I find out on google that he was the richest ancient Greek who was living during the time 595 BC - 546 BC. How silly of me to search for this person in recent times. More about Croesus here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croesus. d. During the plot when Dale and his cop friends discuss the murders, Heather Graham inserts two cases about two different serial killers - one being about serial killer killing prostitutes on Eighth Street; second being about another serial killer who was killing working girls, cutting them up and stuffing them in suitcases. I wonder if these were plots for some of Heather Graham's earlier books. I can only guess until I read all of her books. e. Heather Graham compares one of the detectives from Miami-Dade police force to Frito Bandito and I wondered who was that. Turns out he was a cartoon character for Frito Chips from 1967 to 1971. More about him here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frito_B....
pleasure read, not for official review. Heather Graham always fascinates me. She combines suspense, (sometimes paranormal) and romance in a genuinely unique way. Her humor comes through and livens things. If you're a fan, this one won't let you down. This was an older one of hers.
3.5 Stars (My rating on Goodreads says 4 stars but I rounded up to 4 stars.)
This was just okay for me. I thought this book was pretty hard to get into to start off with… Not to mention it was slow in building the tension and suspense. By about the half mark, things started picking up. The latter half of the book saved it from being a 2 on my scale. Characters were a lot more developed at this point and I was beginning to see what was going on.
This book could probably have been half as long and then it would have been excellent. I liked the story itself and the characters were memorable. But just okay when all was said and done.
Aan de ene kant was het wel echt een spannend boek. Maar aan de andere kant ook wat overdreven en niet altijd even geloofwaardig. Zaten ook plotwissellingen in die ik niet had verwacht. Dus al met al de moeite waard om eens te lezen.
Mediocre romantic suspense & not up to what I was expecting from this author. I didn't particularly take to the main characters (& as their names escape me without looking them up they obviously weren't very memorable either) & the whole story just lacked a bit of oomph...for want of a better word!!
Love Heather Graham and her novels, but this one just was not working it for me. Actually started reading this last year and had to put to the side as it didn't grab me. Decided to finish it and finally did.
Felt like the characters were a bit annoying. Story tended to drag. Felt like at the beginning there it felt like it was repeating a bit with the characters feelings.
There were a few things I really liked and then others where I was eh.
The good: 1. The slow burn. There was no romance between Kelsey and Dane until more than half way through the book. That allowed us to learn more about the other characters, the non-romantic side of the plot, etc.. You knew it was coming so it kept you interested while you waited for it.
2. The setting. I love HG sticking with Florida and the Everglades.
3. All the different possibilities for the "bad guy." I kind of had a hunch the whole time but there were dozens of instances where I changed my mind.
The bad: 1. The reason for the murder/blackmail though. Dumb.
2. The Necktie Strangler? Give me a break. It should not have been who it was. That was almost just like a loose end that needed tying before the book was over.
3. How Kelsey and Dane finally crossed the bridge into a couple/romance side of the novel? Wrong. The whole build-up of Kelsey's character pretty much goes against how her and Dane got together. It was disappointing to read.
4. Kelsey - What a snooty brat.
5. Why was this group of friends so close?! Why did they have adult sleepovers?!
This is one of Heather Graham’s older books but it was a wonderful suspense romance story that had you cheering for Dane Whitelaw even though he was a suspect in the killing of one of his friends, Sheila Warren. Kelsey Cunningham had come down to Key West to spend some time with her old friend but Shelia never showed up. Sheila had a reputation of being gone for periods of time but Kelsey knew something had happened to her friend and that is why she wanted Dane to help her find Sheila. This is an action packed story with lots of twists and turns. Great story
This is a perfect beach read! Fast paced and total fluff... reading it was like watching a movie of the week. It is certainly not, in my opinion, a great literary work but definitely a great, easy read. Someone is killing women and disposing their bodies in the Florida Keys...a group of old friends and locals have an impromptu reunion and try to catch the killer. There are love triangles and trysts along the way.
When Kelsey Cunningham comes home to the Florida Keys to meet her best friend Sheila Warren and she don't show up. Kelsey knows something is wrong. No one seems to be worry cause Sheila disappears for fans without tell anyone else. Dane Whitelaw knows something is really wrong with the disappearance cause someone slid a photo of Sheila's body under his door. He knows someone is framing him and needs his private investigator skills to solve the case and to keep Kelsey sade.
Okay, this was actually good. Not going to lie but when that first “end” happened I was like “that’s it”? I was already planing to write a not so good review but then that happened and it was quite good.
It was kind of not so week explored but it was better then being just Andy.
I didn’t feel the chemistry of Dane and Kelsey that week but it was okay.
Overall it is a nice book, I couldn’t put it down because I was integrated to know what happened.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
I read this book because my son decided to put it in our pile of books we were buying. 😁 I was hoping for a fun murder mystery, but this one frustrated me. Kelsey was such they typical beautiful woman that everyone just loves, so she doesn't have to have any common sense or idea on how to stay out of trouble. She was constantly doing stupid things. There were some interesting side characters, at least, and I had hoped I hadn't figured the murder out, but I did right from the beginning.
A crime mystery set in the beautiful Florida surroundings. An old pack of friends, one of them missing, clarity that one of them is a perpetrator, a romance from the past but also some darkness throughout... many people have something to hide, but who is the killer?... great read for a relaxed afternoon!
Couldn't finish. It is a story about a group of friends from the Florida Keys; one goes missing and another is framed for the murder. The characters are either unlikable or bland and uninteresting, so that the reader really doesn't care what happens to them. Heather Graham writes like she is being paid by the word.
Romantic suspense. A long time friend is missing after inviting Kelsey to come for a visit. High school friends all get together including an old love who is a private investigator searching for answers. With necktie serial murders, the worst is expected. Accusations are thrown around and the ending is a surprise.
HEATHER GRAHAM IS ONE OF MY FAVORITE AUTHORS, AND I'M NEVER DISAPPOINTED. DANE, EX-MILITARY AND A P.I., AND KELSEY, A GRAPHIC AD DESIGNER, ARE GREAT TOGETHER. DANE IS FRAMED FOR A MURDER HE DIDN'T COMMIT, AND KELSEY RUNS INTO THE NECKTIE MURDERER. BUT THAT'S NOT ALL SHE RUNS INTO! HAVE FUN FOLLOWING ALL THE CHARACTERS IN THIS BOOK!
I was pretty disappointed. The first chapter is interesting and gets you hooked, but then it just slows down from there. Page after page of the same thing. Things pick up in the last two chapters but the ending is so blah.
The mystery part was good. Loved the setting of the Florida keys. The part I found weird was that one friend slept with almost all of the gang, One she married then divorced.