"An Exciting New Thrill Ride on the Futuristic world of Harmony"
Celinda Ingram has secrets. Few know the full extent of her
unusually powerful psi abilities or the reason the
professional matchmaker had left Frequency, her family, and
her business behind four months ago under a cloud of
scandal. Fortunately Celinda's reputation as a leading
authority on Covenant Marriages (she wrote the book) landed
her a job with the exclusive Promises, Inc. in Cadence City.
Now all she wants to do is keep a low profile and do what
she did best, match the psychic profiles of her high profile
clients to those best suited for a happy permanent
commitment and avoid any association with the Guilds which
she likens to organized crime. Unfortunately the latter becomes impossible when Celinda's
dust bunny Araminta persuades her to purchase what she
believes to be a cheap toy from a local antique shop. In
fact her five dollar purchase happens to be an extremely
rare and powerful relic left over from the previous alien
civilization and had recently been stolen from the Cadence
Guild. The Guild boss wants it back and has employed Davis
Oakes of Oakes security, to recover the item. Oakes has rare abilities as well. Davis has secrets too.
Born into a long line of Ghost Hunters, he is a hunter by
nature. However his personal talent is much more unique
having the ability to pull silver ghost light from a
different part of the spectrum than the others.
Unfortunately his talents can rarely be used without severe
consequences to his health and in dream state can have
interesting side affects as well. Surprisingly his psi also resonates very strongly with
Celinda's causing her to tag him "Mr. Perfect" and although
she has no respect for Guild business and he's been recently
burned by another professional Covenant matchmaker, they are
instantly intrigued with each other. Each would have no
doubt gone their own way if Araminta has not had strong
objections to her toy being given to the detective. When the
dust bunny makes off with the relic, Davis has no choice but
to keep Celinda close and asks her out to dinner. She
accepts but from there things get complicated. When the pair is almost taken out following their dinner
meeting and return to Celinda's ransacked apartment, it soon
becomes obvious that someone else knows about the relic
and will stop at nothing to possess it. Elsewhere a
unethical parapsychologist has the relic's twin and is fully
aware of its potential for mind control when used by one
with his own unique psi abilities. Celinda is expected back in Frequency over the weekend due
to her sister's wedding. Davis believes she needs a
bodyguard and proposes himself -- as her date for the affair.
This poses additional problems, explaining why a Covenant
matchmaker would bring a man of such short acquaintance to a
family affair and returning to the scene of her unsavory
experience with the unbalanced Guild member she'd refused to
take as a client. (The true reason she left town). Naturally they wind up on the run and in life threatening
positions in which only their own rare talents and strong
emotional attachment to each other will save the day. This
adventure was a complete thrill ride. Although Silver Master
is the 4th title in Ms. Castle's Ghost Hunter series it is
the first I have read. It won't be the last. I felt the
story stood well on its own, with the preface explaining the
major premise of Harmony. However from reading other reviews
I realize that many of the secondary characters that appear
briefly in Silver Master have appeared previously. I will
certainly be acquiring the series backlist as soon as
possible. An excellent futuristic read that I highly recommend.
Reviewed by Leslie Tramposch
Posted November 4, 2007
|
