Review: Cry No More by Linda Howard

Title: Cry No More
Author: Linda Howard
Genre: romantic suspense
Grade: A-
Reason for reading: For some reason I really like suspense-y books which feature children prominently, and it seems like this book came under my radar because people mentioned how intense it was.

Synopsis from Bookreporter.com:

Bestselling author Linda Howard is at the top of her game with this romantic suspense novel that shifts into emotional high gear in the first chapter when a six-week old baby is snatched from his mother’s arms on a street in Mexico.

For Milla and her doctor husband, David, life had been pretty close to perfect until that horrible moment. They were young, madly in love and had just been blessed with the gift of their newborn baby, Justin. Despite Milla’s concerns at giving birth in Mexico where David was volunteering at a health clinic, everything had gone off without a hitch. But her relief and joy at being a new mom was abruptly shattered when Justin is brutally and inexplicably taken from her in a vicious attack.

After recovering from the near-fatal stab wounds inflicted by the kidnappers, Milla vows never to give up until she finds her son, who was likely stolen for an illegal adoption ring trafficking in black market babies. Her marriage eventually collapses under the enormous strain of grief and her obsessive drive to find Justin at all costs. In the ten years following the kidnapping, Milla dedicates herself to the cause of finding lost children by establishing the Finders organization. Her tireless work in seeking the missing enables her to both pursue leads for her son and numb the pain of her own loss.

Although the trail for Justin had long since grown cold in the ten years since the kidnapping, an anonymous phone tip may suddenly lead Milla to her son’s kidnappers. A mysterious assassin named Diaz becomes her unlikely ally in the search, and she finds herself powerfully and physically drawn to him against her better judgment. The attentions of a wealthy local businessman with an agenda of his own complicates the picture and Milla finds herself caught up in a web of deception and deceit, uncertain of who to trust, even amongst her closest friends. On the twisted and danger-fraught trail of cold-blooded killers, she and Diaz slowly unravel the horrible and shocking truth behind the illicit baby adoption operation and a related organ smuggling scheme. When at last Milla is given the vengeance she deserves and the information she had so long craved, she is forced to make the most difficult decision of her life, resulting in an emotional and bittersweet conclusion.

My Thoughts: Wow. This really was an intense book. The plot is tight, the characters are rivveting, and the book packs a hell of an emotional wallop. I’m not a mother myself, but I loved Milla’s fierce determination to find her son at all costs. The things that she was willing to do for her baby were extraordinary, and she was a strong, fierce woman who didn’t need to prove her strength and fierceness.

I also loved Diaz. He’s a cold, detached man, and I thought that he was wonderfully bad-ass. No posturing or emo bullshit for him–he simply gets the job done. We didn’t spend much time in his head, but I loved his determination to stick by Milla, even when she wasn’t sure about him. I like the strong, silent type, and that fit Diaz to a tee.

I also particularly liked that Ms. Howard didn’t go the stereotypical route with regard to Milla’s relationship with her ex-husband. I believed that David and Milla grew apart, and David wasn’t villified. For that matter, I particularly liked the subtle drama playing out between Milla and all the people in her life. Losing a child is a traumatic experience, and everyone in the book reacted to it in a way that seemed real to me.

As for the plot, for the most part it worked well for me. The action was intense, and the romance elements provided some quiet moments. That being said, I thought that the climax was a bit anticlimactic. Like Milla, I would have preferred a big final showdown, although I can’t penalize Ms. Howard for not doing that because I thought that what happened was much more realistic. Still, one of the biggest problems I saw was that the villain was revealed very early on, which in some cases can add to the suspense, but in this case it sort of detracted from the overall storyline.

Overall, this was a very good book. I was a little underwhelmed by the last Linda Howard book I read, but if she’s got any more like this, I will be coming back.