The Policewoman, by Justin W. M. Roberts

[Werner]

I'm setting this thread up on behalf of our fellow group member, Justin. This will be the place where fans of his Policewoman character can discuss her exploits and those of other characters in the book. It'll also be the go-to place for Justin's news about events, giveaways, sequels if any, etc.

[Justin]

Thanks for setting this up, Werner!

The Giveaway for The Policewoman will end on January 13, 2017! Go to https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/sh... to enter.

Fantastic fast-paced story, this would make an excellent movie!" -Review by Anne-Marie Reynolds - 5 Stars at ReadersFavorite.com

Want a free thriller to jump-start 2017? Enter for a chance to win one of five copies of "The Policewoman".

In the year 2026, narcoterrorism wreaks havoc on the world as drug cartels operate as dominating, murderous dictatorships. The powerful Irish Drug Cartel has set up drug manufacturing plants in England, Ireland, and Indonesia and they will kill anyone who gets in their way.

Sarah is an ambitious policewoman from an antiterrorist unit called Densus-88. She’s also smart, beautiful, and extremely good at her job, which is why she is assigned to an Interpol Incident Response Team, set up to find and stop The Cartel. Alongside colleagues from the United Kingdom’s SAS, she must quickly learn new Close Quarters Battle tactics and apply them to a vengeful and threatening battlefield.

Sarah’s investigation appears to be going well until the fight turns personal. She must now struggle to save her friends, family, and even herself. Spanning the globe with a keen knowledge of special forces tactics and some genuinely shocking twists, The Policewoman is a staggering novel that warns of a bloody, drug-addled future we may soon face.

[Justin]

Hi everyone!

I just wanted to let you know that The Policewoman won the 2017 Gold Medal from Readers' Favorite International Book Awards. Here's the link: https://readersfavorite.com/2017-awar...

Thank you all for your support :-)

Justin

[Werner]

Congratulations, Justin!

[E.G.]

Congratulations!

[Justin]

Thanks!

[Werner]

Justin was kind enough, earlier this year, to gift me with a very handsome hardcover review copy of this novel. Now that I've read it, it has my enthusiastic recommendation, with a few content warnings that I mention in my five-star review, here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . I should also have mentioned (there's always something I forget to put in, when typing a review!) that it's written in third-person, present tense. That's a difficult narrative mode to pull off, and takes some getting used to; but I adjusted to it pretty quickly.

[Justin]

Dear Action Heroine Fans,

Thank you for choosing The Policewoman for this group's common read. Below are the links to download the book for free:

Epub: http://www.mediafire.com/file/3o5av3c...
PDF: http://www.mediafire.com/file/6gelo48...
Kindle: http://www.mediafire.com/file/atwcb2y...

Be advised that if you read the reviews, a lot of people complained about the first 4 or 5 chapters. It doesn't have much action in those early chapters, so if you find it hard to get through, please push through until you finish Chapter 6. If you like Chapter 6, then I'm sure you'll like the rest of the book.

Thanks again for choosing The Policewoman :-)

Justin

[Werner]

During this month, those in the group who want to take part will be reading this book as a common read, so I've moved it to this folder for the duration. If you have comments, questions, reactions, reviews, background information or links, etc., post them here!

[Justin]

Thanks for arranging this, Werner :-)

[Werner]

No problem, Justin!

[Werner]

Has anyone starting reading this yet?

Justin, perhaps you'd care to share a comment or two about your inspiration/reasons for writing, what research you did, etc.?

[Mike]

The Policewoman is one of my top five books. Here is the review I posted after reading it.

I was given an e-version of The Policewoman for review by author Justin W.M. Roberts.

The Policewoman has joined my personal list of favorite books, in fact I would place it in my top five. It's that good.

First off let's get the genre out of the way. The Policewoman is at its heart an action/adventure/romance. It is also a crime story, a special ops primer, and a real culture lesson for some of us.

The Policewoman is no boiler plate, formulaic, predictable good guys versus bad guys story. Our hero and heroine are not invincible superheroes but they are nobody to mess with. There is a lot of information here detailing how special ops teams function. This did make the story take a bit longer to develop than the reader may be used to. But it is definitely worth it, it enhances the story as the action and suspense build.

The Policewoman is a very intense story and will grab the reader viscerally, much more emotionally engaging than most other books in the genre. I dare you to not get emotionally hooked, I dare you! But there are moments of levity and downright humor to help lighten the vibe from time to time. This balance is integral to the story, keeping it from being one note and oppressive.

Basically the story is Indonesia, England and Ireland are fighting a drug cartel. No "measured responses" no diplomatic interference. Just no holds barred all out war.

The story is set between Indonesia and Great Britain, so there were a lot of cultural references that were new to me and added flavor to the story.

Great action scenes, graphic violence, not as graphic sex, love both romantic and filial, bureaucratic roadblocks, honor, duty, service and patriotism.

I just found out from the author that a sequel is forthcoming. Once you have read the book you will be as surprised and intrigued as I.

I loved this book. If you like your action/adventure to be more in depth and realistic, The Policewoman by Justin W.M. Roberts (if you look him up on line, be sure to include the W.M. or you'll get the wrong author) will satisfy for sure. Though his bio does not give any such info, The Policewoman reads to me as written by some one with more than a passing knowledge of the field of special ops. I highly recommend this book! Enjoy!

[Mervi]

Yes. I'm about 30% in. For some reason, I expected this to be a modern day action/thriller, so I was a bit surprised to find out that it's set in 2026. The romance aspect is pretty heavy already. I'm not a romance reader so, it's a bit disappointing. But now I hope that the courtship/jealousy stuff is done with. Otherwise I've liked it quite a lot. I'm also not familiar with military stuff at all so it's been interesting so see that side. The bad guys are well-done.

The present tense is bit unusual but I've read some books which use it, so it's not a problem for me. However, I realized that I'm very, very used to third (or first) person POV so the ominicient narrator voice was quite unexpected and I have to get used to it every time I return to reading.

[Werner]

I've gotten used to present-tense narration, but mostly in the first person, where it brings a sense of "you are there" immediacy. At first, it sounded more awkward in third person, so that took some getting used to. (A third person omniscient viewpoint wasn't problematic to me in itself, because it's quite common in the older fictional classics that I read.)

Romantic love does play a major role in the plot. Personally, that didn't bother me, though I could have done without the sexual content.

[Justin]

Hi Werner,

Which fictional classic uses third person, present tense?

Oh, and here's the answer to your question. I couldn't find a perfect heroine so I decided to write one myself. The plot of this book was in my mind for about 3 years before I took the plunge and finally put it into writing. Since I love accurate details, 75% of my time was for research. It took more than 2 years and hundreds of reviewers to fine-tune the manuscript and along the way, managed to win a gold medal from Readers' Favorite (Fiction - Military genre).

The biggest mistake was calling this book "The Policewoman", implying that it's a crime fiction. I should've called it "The Irish Cartel" or something. Although the heroine really is a policewoman, the genre is mostly military action thriller, which usually surprised the crime fiction fans who bought the book.

Justin

[Werner]

Justin wrote: "Hi Werner,

Which fictional classic uses third person, present tense?"

None of them do; I obviously was a bit unclear in what I wrote. I'm used to a third-person, omniscient viewpoint, because a lot of older fictional classics employ it (although they employ it in the past tense). What took a little getting used to was the combination here of third person AND present tense. (However, I did quickly get used to it!)

[Mervi]

I finished the book and I liked it. Sarah is a great action heroine!

[Justin]

Hi Mervi,

I'm glad you enjoyed it. Any feedback?

Justin

[Mervi]

The review is on my blog: https://mervih.wordpress.com/2018/03/...
Sorry for not linking it right away.

[Justin]

Excellent review, Mervi :-)

[Werner]

Mervi, I had no idea you were a book blogger; that's cool! Is there any reason why you didn't post the review here on Goodreads? I like your review, speaking "unofficially;" but if it were posted here, I could use the "Like" button to like it "officially." :-)

[Mervi]

Thanks Justin and Werner!
I've posted my review on Goodreads.
I feel that when a book (or a comic) has a lot, say over a 100, reviews it doesn't really matter if I post a review here or not. And I'm not at all a professional blogger.

[Werner]

I gave your review it's first official "like" just now, Mervi! :-)

A professional blogger, I guess, would be one who makes a living at it --which I suppose a person could, if he/she had enough followers to make a lot of advertisers want to pay money to reach them. But I doubt if many bloggers have that kind of following. IMO, anybody who has the moxie, techno-savvy, and willingness to commit their time to create a blog deserves some credit for it. (It's something I've never attempted, and probably never will!)