MORTAL FIRE: The Secret of the Journal by C.F.Dunn

About the book

Twenty-nine-year-old, independent, and self-assured Cambridge history professor Emma D'Eresby has one obsession in life: the curious journal of a seventeenth-century Englishman, a portion of which was left to her by her late grandfather.

When an unexpected opportunity to study the journal in its entirety presents itself, Emma finds herself leaving Cambridge to take up a year-long position at a prestigious university in Maine. Anticipating a quiet year of research, Emma quickly discovers her work impeded by a range of unforeseen complications. 

From the start, there is the well-intentioned matchmaking of her vivacious Russian colleague, Elena Smalova, and the unexpected jailing of one of her post-graduate students. More troublesome, however, are the unsolved, brutal night attacks on women near the university and Emma's suspicion that they might be linked to the sinister English professor, Kort Staahl. But, most diverting and disconcerting of all, is Emma's growing attraction to the strikingly handsome Dr. Matthew Lyons, whose kind but deliberately distant demeanor puzzles her.

Suspense and dread mount when Kort begins to take a persistent and unsettling interest in Emma. What are Kort's intentions, and what is he capable of? And the mystery surrounding Matthew only deepens when Emma discovers a link between him and the journal. What is Matthew trying to hide?

Read Chapter One here

C.F.Dunn runs a specialist dyslexia and autism school in south east England, and writes in the south west.

Here is the link to C.F. Dunn's website

My Review

I am always excited to receive a package in the mail. Invariably it contains a new book for reviewing. I usually have a few books going at the same time in the review process, so I will let a new one wait until I get the others finished. Can't get too many books going at once. 

However, today when I received the review copy of Mortal Fire, I knew it was a book that couldn't wait to be read. The cover alone was intriguing. Dark and mysterious, old books in the foreground and an eye surrounded by wisps of smoke. Very intriguing, indeed. But the best part lay in-between the pages. 

Once I began reading this book, I couldn't put it down. I only stopped because my dogs wouldn't stop pestering me to take them outside. I had to know what was going to happen next. 

Extremely well-written, strong, bold characters and a plot so tight with suspense I found myself holding my breath more often than not.

Emma D'Eresby, a visiting History professor from England, is on a journey, a quest, searching for a lost journal. The people she meets at Howard's Lake College in Maine, USA, are a cast of characters in and of themselves. Sam Wiesner, the "lady's man;" Elena Smalova, intelligent and excitable, and Matthew Lynes, mysterious, strong, and maybe even something more.... just who is he?

Mortal Fire is a book you want to read with the lights on and during the day. But if you are like me.... you won't be able to put it down.

You can purchase your copy here: 

http://store.kregel.com/searchproducts.cfm

www.amazon.com

This review was made possible by Kregel Publications providing me with a free review copy. I am under no obligation to write a positive review.