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WORK TITLE: Heated Pursuit
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: http://www.aprilhuntbooks.com/
CITY:
STATE: VA
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:
RESEARCHER NOTES:
N/A
PERSONAL
Married; children: two.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
April Hunt is a Virginia-based novelist who specializes in romantic suspense stories. The contributor of a short biographical blurb on the writer’s home page, April Hunt Books, wrote: “There isn’t a day that passes when she’s not dreaming up yet another happily ever after.” Her first three novels are entries in her “Alpha Security” series—a series of stories revolving around a team of special operatives who specialize in dangerous missions that cannot be handled by the military. The series debut, Heated Pursuit, features an operative named Rafe Ortega, who “along with his team (of other very alpha men),” explained a Smexy Books reviewer, “… finds himself in Honduras to hunt down a gun/sex slave/bad dude drug cartel leader. His team has quietly been working to locate him for some time now. But the quiet time is going to come to an end.” The beginning of the end is signaled by the arrival of bounty hunter Penny Kline, in hot pursuit of a relative who has been stolen away. “Penny . . . didn’t come to Honduras on a pleasure trip,” said a contributor to Harlequin Junkie. “She’s here to rescue her kidnapped niece, the only family she’s got left. What she didn’t plan on was walking into a covert ops mission—or being wrapped up in the hard-muscled arms of Rafe Ortega . . . but no man can have a hold on her heart until her niece is home “
Rafe and red-headed Penny make a fiery combination, especially after the two are thrown together when the team seizes her, believing that she works for the kidnapper/gun runner. The team releases her after Penny is recognized by an old friend who happens to serve on the squad. Then they hit on a possible solution to their problem: let Penny and Rafe train as a team and then pose as a couple in order to facilitate the rescue of Penny’s niece. “Let me tell you,” asserted a reviewer for Nalla Reads, “this little firecracker red-head was one of the best sassy female leads I’ve read in a long time. Penny holds her own and fights for what she believes in and has trained [extensively] in order to rescue Rachel. She’s got one hell of a strong mind.”
Later volumes in the series include Holding Fire, which features Penny’s old friend Trey Hanson, and Hard Justice, which introduces a female operative known as “Charlie” Sparks. A Publishers Weekly reviewer stated that Heated Pursuit “satisfactorily kicks off an adventure-packed romance series, and readers will eagerly anticipate the next installment.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Publishers Weekly, September 26, 2016, review of Heated Pursuit, p. 73.
ONLINE
April Hunt Books, http://www.aprilhuntbooks.com (July 21, 2017), author profile.
Harlequin Junkie, http://harlequinjunkie.com/ (October 20, 2016), review of Heated Pursuit.
Nalla Reads, https://nallareads.com/ (October 25, 2016), review of Heated Pursuit.
Smexy Books, http://smexybooks.com/ (October 26, 2016), review of Heated Pursuit.*
April blames her addiction for chocolate on growing up near the country's chocolate capital, Hershey, Pennsylvania. Born and raised in a rural area, April always had lots of time to cultivate an active imagination, penning her first book at the age of ten, with a child's typewriter a lot of liquid white-out. Even though both her stories and writing methods have changed drastically through the years, one thing hasn't.
Her imagination.
Cowboys, military men, and alpha bad boys with a penchant for corrupting the good girl are among her favorite heroes to bring to the page. As both a contemporary and romantic suspense author, April loves sweet, second-chance romances as well as the thrills and squeals of being involved with a man who feels more naked without his Glock than without his skivvies.
When April's not donning her writing gloves, she's busy raising two energetic kids and husband. And there isn't a day that passes when she's not dreaming up yet another happily ever after...
April blames her incurable chocolate addiction on growing up in rural Pennsylvania, way too close to America’s chocolate capital in Hershey, Pa. She now lives in Virginia with her college sweetheart husband, two young children, and a cat who thinks she’s a human-dog hybrid. On those rare occasions she’s not donning the cape of her children’s personal chauffeur, April’s either planning, plotting, or writing about her next alpha hero and the woman he never knew he needed, but now can’t live without.
Heated Pursuit
Publishers Weekly.
263.39 (Sept. 26, 2016): p73.
COPYRIGHT 2016 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Heated Pursuit
April Hunt. Forever, $5.99 mass market (304p) ISBN 978-1-4555-3945-1
Hunt's romantic suspense debut, which launches the Alpha Security Series, smartly balances slow-burning passion and explosive high-stakes
danger. In present-day Honduras, sassy American Penny Kline is bent on rescuing her ' kidnapped niece from a ruthless drug kingpin, Diego
Fuentes, when she crosses paths with Alpha Security operative Rafe Ortega and his covert operation to destroy Fuentes. Despite the Alpha motto,
"The mission comes first," tantalizing banter, titillating moves, and past demons all keep sexual tension burning between Penny and Rafe until
Fuentes forces a desperate move. The couple pose as a self-made millionaire and his "American arm candy" girlfriend and visit Fuentes's off-thegrid
fortress home, hoping to gain his trust. Dodging Fuentes's intense scrutiny, Rafe and Penny discover distressing information and find
pleasure in their sizzling sexual relationship. But time is running out for stopping the drug distribution, finding Penny's niece, and cementing their
relationship. Rafe's skills and Penny's gritty attitude make survival possible, but any misstep may prove fatal. This book satisfactorily kicks off an
adventure-packed romance series, and readers will eagerly anticipate the next installment. Agent: Sarah Younger, Nancy Yost Literary. (Nov.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Heated Pursuit." Publishers Weekly, 26 Sept. 2016, p. 73. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA465558224&it=r&asid=c39e275ecc11170a281c41b5d411adc0. Accessed 1 June
2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A465558224
You are here: Home / April Hunt / Review: Heated Pursuit by April Hunt
Review: Heated Pursuit by April Hunt
October 26, 2016 By Mandi 2 Comments
29246613Heated Pursuit by April Hunt (Alpha Security #1)
Released: October 25, 2016
Romantic Suspense
Forever
Reviewed by Mandi
Alpha Security operative Rafe has an impressive background. Former Delta operative, he is now with a super secret group that goes in when there can’t be government interference. Along with his team (of other very alpha men) he finds himself in Honduras to hunt down a gun/sex slave/bad dude drug cartel leader. His team has quietly been working to locate him for some time now. But the quiet time is going to come to an end.
Penny is a bounty hunter who is desperate to find her niece who was kidnapped by this drug cartel. She gets in some trouble in a bad part of town and Penny herself is abducted – but by Rafe and his men. They don’t know what she is doing in this part of town, and they take her back to question her. When Trey, a teammate of Rafe’s recognizes Penny as a woman he was raised with, they realize she isn’t working for the bad guy. Penny is determined to find Rachel, and tries to prove her skills to Rafe and his men.
One of my favorite black-op military style romantic suspense series is Black Ops Inc by Cindy Gerard. That series is my gold standard that I hold others up to. This one has that fun, a little over the top feel to it – with men who are oozing testosterone out of their pores. I like a good solid, alpha black ops team that treat each other as brothers but also have that sharp banter. We get that generally here. I could have used a little more banter, or more time with just the guys hanging out but we had enough time with the others that I’m interested in their future books.
Penny has to be tough to hang with these guys who want to immediately send her back home. I felt like Penny definitely did not have the skill set to hang with these guys on a mission. She tries to prove herself – and I give her credit for that. I found it unrealistic the team leader would let her go in undercover with his elite group. There is a reason that these guys are part of this group – and Penny just doesn’t have the training to even come close.
Rafe gets so many freaking boners in this book – that he leads with his dick, and not his brain. I think he was at half-mast through the entire book.
She was the ultimate weapon, had the ability to get him hard with an innocent look and singe his core with just a promise of a touch.
Guard your core, Rafe!
This is a very steamy romantic suspense. I felt like the sex and the amount of it fit the overall over the top feel to the book. I mean – Rafe had to do something with his constant hard-on.
Penny annoyed me a little bit with her running into black op missions in which she has zero training for. Rafe annoyed me a bit with his boner coming to life every time Penny looked his way. But otherwise it was fun and sexy.
Grade: C+
HEATED PURSUIT – An April Hunt Review
October 25, 2016
**ARC received from NetGalley for an honest review**
April Hunt’s Heated Pursuit is one hot, thrilling, alpha novel the likes of Maya Banks’ KGI and Julie Ann Walker’s BKI. I hadn’t read anything from her before but was immediately hooked from the synopsis!
Penny Kline has made the drastic change from counselor to bounty hunter when the last member of her family, her beloved nice Rachel, is kidnapped by the kingpin of drug lords. Little did she expect to run in to alpha hottie Rafe Ortega on her mission to Honduras to infiltrate and rescue.
Let me tell you this little firecracker red-head was one of the best sassy female leads I’ve read in a long time. Penny holds her own and fights for what she believes in and has trained for in order to rescue Rachel. She’s got one hell of a strong mind and pushes herself to cross lines she never would’ve imagined. Fighting deadly mean in alleyways, going undercover to a crime lords home, running through the jungle in a suicide mission; this girl does it all with no fear and mega-courage. I love, love, LOVED Penny.
Rafe was one hot-headed alpha; something we’re used to seeing. But there was something different about him that made me like him. You DO see his caring side form the get go. Penny does try to drag it out of him, try to make him see it. But I liked that as a reader we got the chance to see his thought processes and how he saw Penny and the world around him. It was a lot brighter that he even thought himself. Plus he had just the right amount of bossy that would melt any girl. These two were a match made in jungle heaven!
I’m so excited for more the Alpha Security series from April Hunt! Trey’s book is next (Penny’s seemingly long lost somewhat foster brother). But i’m a bit more excited for Vince’s or Charlie’s book!!!
Unitl next review…
XOXO Nalla
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5200579.jpg.pngApril blames her addiction for chocolate on growing up near the country’s chocolate capital, Hershey, Pennsylvania. Born and raised in a rural area, April always had lots of time to cultivate an active imagination, penning her first book at the age of ten, with a child’s typewriter a lot of liquid white-out. Even though both her stories and writing methods have changed drastically through the years, one thing hasn’t.
Her imagination.
Cowboys, military men, and alpha bad boys with a penchant for corrupting the good girl are among her favorite heroes to bring to the page. As both a contemporary and romantic suspense author, April loves sweet, second-chance romances as well as the thrills and squeals of being involved with a man who feels more naked without his Glock than without his skivvies.
When April’s not donning her writing gloves, she’s busy raising two energetic kids and husband. And there isn’t a day that passes when she’s not dreaming up yet another happily ever after…
REVIEW: Heated Pursuit by April Hunt
Posted October 20th, 2016 by Sara @HarlequinJunkie in Blog, Review, Romantic Suspense / 2 comments
In Heated Pursuit by April Hunt, the debut novel by April Hunt, bounty Heated-Pursuithunter Penny Kline is in Honduras to rescue her niece, Rachel. There she runs into the Alpha Security team, who are after the same man Penny believes took Rachel. Trey, a man she had considered to be a brother until he seemed to have fallen off the face of the earth, is a member of the team and against her having anything to do with the rescue mission. In fact, all the team members are hesitant to bring her along but she refuses to be left behind, and they soon realize they need her help. In order to get close to Diego Fuentes, Rafe and Penny must go undercover as a couple.
Rafe Ortega is immediately attracted to Penny, but he’s initially hesitant to try anything with her because of her relationship with Trey. When they’re forced to spend countless hours alone together, his hesitations fly out the window. Meanwhile Penny gets to see man Rafe really is, not the man he outwardly portrays.
==She’d quickly learned he was a bit more than a soldier–a lot more. He’d taken a chance on her, believed in her when she didn’t entirely believe in herself. He pushed aside his own Fuentes agenda to help her focus on hers…Rachel. And she had no doubt that whether for one of his friends or a perfect stranger, he’d step straight into a bullet and not think twice.
That was Rafe. Not soldier Rafe. Or Alpha Rafe. But the man Rafe.==
I liked Penny. She was determined, feisty, and had a never-quit attitude. There were times she was a bit reckless (it wasn’t really the brightest idea to go to Honduras without backup), but when it mattered she was willing to listen to the people who knew what they were doing. She was willing to put in the training the Alpha team thought she needed before going out into the field. No matter how hard anything was, she never gave up.
My only issue with the book was that, at times, it felt like there were more sex scenes than actual story. In fact, there was so many sex scenes I found myself starting to just skim them and I just skipped one completely. It felt like they were just fillers that didn’t add anything to the progression of their relationship.
Overall this was a decent romantic suspense novel, I just would have preferred to have seen more of the suspense story and less of the sex.
Book Info:
03SPublication: October 25, 2016 | Forever | Alpha Security #1
Penny Kline didn’t come to Honduras on a pleasure trip. She’s here to rescue her kidnapped niece, the only family she’s got left. What she didn’t plan on was walking into a covert ops mission—or being wrapped up in the hard-muscled arms of Rafe Ortega. The cool-as-ice operative’s touch may get her all hot and bothered, but no man can have a hold on her heart until her niece is home where she belongs.
Even in the tropics, Alpha Security operative Rafe can take down the bad guys without breaking a sweat. Hostage extractions. Clandestine missions. Those are the things he’s been trained to handle. Relationships? Not so much. But one look at this strong, sexy redhead and he’s seized by a fierce urge to protect her at all costs. Now Penny and Rafe will have to up their game because they’re about to go into a master criminal’s lair without backup, and the danger—and passion—is about to explode . . .