My rating: 2.5 of 5 stars
BOOK DESCRIPTION FROM THE AUTHOR: Andrea Wilton and Brian Strait, from Shuster Detective Agency, take on another case to find a missing person. This second book in the series introduces DJ Wiebe, a biker who rides with The Sons Riders, a Christian biker ministry. Another biker, a member of The Demons Raiders, is missing and presumed dead. DJ, his friend, hires Shuster Detective Agency to find him. He initiates Andrea and Brian into the biker culture, a world that encompasses motorcycles, leather, drugs and murder.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR (from her page, EaglesNest): Barbara Ann Derksen, author of 13 books, along with her husband, are members of Christian Motorcyclists Association in Canada and in the US. Five of her books are devotionals that target bikers, but the message is pertinent to all. Her favorite genre is murder mystery, but each book brings forth characters who rely on God as they solve the puzzles in their lives.
SERIES: "Wilton/Strait Murder Mysteries" Although I didn't read the first book in this series, Vanished, I had no problem catching up on the adventures Brian and Andrea had in Haiti, and how those played into the current story. At the end of the first book, they formed a detective agency, and their first cases make up the story of book 2, Presumed Dead.
PARENTAL RATING (May contain spoilers): PG-13. The development of the budding relationship between Andrea and Brian is clean, although we see the struggle to maintain purity and Brian's flirting is, at times, pretty strong. There are also references to lost innocence and women passed around to various men, a scene of attempted rape, and a few descriptions of gruesome torture--my personal least favorite thing to read--at the hands of kidnappers. I won't be passing this one along to my teen daughters.
The overabundance of grammar and punctuation errors made this a pretty tough read at times, and the ease at which characters made decisions to accept Christ felt a bit stiff. But the story flowed well and kept my attention. These amateur detectives are constantly finding themselves in danger, related to either the drug-trafficking biker gang they're spying on or the abused teenager they seek to rescue.
In the middle of all this constant commotion, the two manage to make decisions about the possibility of their relationship progressing past friendship. Through it all, they demonstrate Christian morals and fierce bonds of loyalty. I love Brian's opinions on dating and marriage, and how these are worked into the conversations he has with Andrea.
The author draws from her experience in CMA to form the Sons Riders, a group of motorcyclists who minister to other groups. I particularly like the way Mrs. Derksen fleshed out the ministry strategy of these men, explaining how they form relationships with those they want to reach out to. Motorcyclists who read this will enjoy the accuracy in descriptions of handling the bikes, the use of terms common to riders, and the humor of newbies trying to figure it all out.
You can purchase Presumed Dead as a paperback or Kindle edition here.
**I received a free copy of this ebook to review. I was not required to write a positive review, nor was I compensated in any other way. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with FTC Regulations. I am part of The CWA Review Crew.
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