Lovely super hot prequel. This is the prologue to Striking Distance and you really should read it first. I really felt a sense of tension when they were breaking the law to hook up in Dubai. ( )

First Strike was the story of the first meeting of Laura and Javier from the I-Team series. As with most novellas, it was very short, but it did have a nice cliffhanger at the end leading into the book, Striking Distance. Mostly, this book was just an excuse for lots of erotic scenes showing the two characters' attraction to one another. An interesting way to get the reader interested in the next I-Team book. ( )

Author Pamela Clare has been so clever with her marketing that I find it impossible to review the prequel FIRST STRIKE without also talking about the novel that it prefaces, so be sure to read my review of STRIKING DISTANCE too. I’ll leave the finer points of the story descriptions to the blurbs, but here’s the gist of how these books fit together:

In FIRST STRIKE we meet Laura, an American TV reporter covering the Middle East, staging in Dubai before heading back to work in controversial territories, and we meet Javier, an American Navy SEAL, in Dubai for an R&R weekend after months of action with his team. Neither are looking for a relationship, so a weekend of no-strings passion is their only intention. After three dynamic days (& nights!), they turn their backs on the strong bond they’d unexpectedly formed. And then BAM! Pamela Clare leaves you with a cliffhanger tragedy of an ending.

Fast forward 18 months and you’re in the STRIKING DISTANCE prologue. Unbeknownst to the world, Laura has been held hostage by an Al-Qaeda group since just after Javier kissed her goodbye in Dubai. Javier is the SEAL team leader of an op against a compound where the last thing he expected was to rescue the woman he hasn’t been able to stop thinking about for over a year. Chapter one opens two years after the rescue, with Laura now working as an investigative newspaper reporter in Denver, Colorado, and Javier on leave, suffering from PTSD. Laura and Javier are brought together once again, each with a freight train of personal baggage, working side by side to extinguish a terrorist threat.

Right. Let’s back-up.

Romantic suspense is my favorite reading genre and I’ve been a big fan of the I-Team series for years, but I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about an ‘erotic romance novella’, where all the action would be confined to a bedroom (or elevator, or bathtub, or …) rather than at gunpoint, but I honestly loved it. It wasn’t just an exercise of ‘how many ways can two puzzle pieces fit together’; there was genuine emotional connection and the chemistry leapt off the page. Clare’s use of language (as in word choice, not profanity) really nails the intensity of the characters’ personalities and their chemistry. The unexpected bonus was the Dubai setting, which was a character unto itself.

I really love that Clare gave readers the chance to get to know Laura and Javier before their lives were destroyed during the gap between the novella’s last chapter and the novel’s first. For anyone that read the Striking Distance prologue online before First Strike was published (or you can still read it now), the end of this novella is particularly powerful.

For an erotic romance novella there isn’t anything I’d wish to be better or different, so comparing apples to apples, I easily give it 5 stars within its genre. Check out some of my favorite First Strike quotes here at Goodreads.

*Original review posted on my blog at Romance Refined* ( )

Short scorching smoking hot prequel to "Striking Distance" coming out in November.
Look no further perverts!

*Oh my god, I went to Clare's website and read the prequel chapter in Striking Distance. Let's just say I would cut someone to get that book in my hands right this second.
Holy stressful and suspenseful. ( )

First Strike
5 Stars

Not usually a fan of novellas but this one is brilliant. Laura and Javier are smokin' hot together and this novella (which is actually more of a prologue to the full length book) really whet my appetite for reading Striking Distance. ( )