Review: The Heat Is On by Helen Louise Caroll

Helen Louise Caroll

The Heat Is On

Amber Allure, October 30, 2011 | 64 pages

Author’s Goodreads | Book on Goodreads | Buy book here

Backblurb:
Hunter Babineaux is a man of fire. The hot Cajun can start an inferno with a single thought.
Christian VanValkenburgh is cool and collected. The frosty New Englander can stop a psychic in his tracks.
Teaming up in a summer resort town to locate an untrained and potentially dangerous pyrokinetic child, the two men discover that opposites attract... in the hottest of ways...

Genre & Keywords:
M/M Romance, Paranormal, Psychic Abilities, Pyrokinetics, Cajun, Investigation



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Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Heat level: 2 out of 3
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The Heat Is On is a short novella in which a paranormal world is presented like it’s the start of a new series. I haven’t been able to find information about that, so I don’t know if it’s really the start of a new series, but it does feel like it. I definitely would be interested in more stories set in this world. For now, I’ve read it as a standalone story.

We meet two men in The Heat Is On who both work for some sort of agency, The Claremont Foundation. All employees of the Foundation are psychics with a variety of gifts (telekinetic, pyrokinetic, pre-cognitive, etc) who are trained to find, help and place other psychics where they can use their abilities without fear or harm. The two men, Hunter Babineaux and Christian VanValkenburgh, are sent together on a mission to find a pyrokinetic kid, who has just discovered his ability to set things on fire but can’t control it yet, so he’s becoming an explosive fire hazard for his surroundings.
Hunter is a pyrokinetic himself, and Christian has the rare ability to cancel out other psychic activity. Hunter and Christian have never been on a mission together before and they are like fire and ice – on first appearance. They turn out to be highly attracted to one another, while they always were under the impression the other one disliked them. Sharing a hotel room together brings out their more deeper feelings and they soon burn up the sheets, which makes for some very hot scenes. We get both their points of view, so their feelings are right there on the surface for the reader, while the heroes are kept in the dark a little longer.

As said, along with this sexy and romantic plot-line we get an investigation angle as well: the search for the boy. This second plot-line is helped forward pretty swiftly by some convenient coincidences which make that the heroes find the boy rather fast and are able to ‘solve the case’ to everybody’s satisfaction. Both story arcs move ahead a bit too efficiently rapid, but given the number of pages this novella counts it’s not surprising. Nevertheless, I would’ve liked the story to be more elaborate to give it more depth in both the world building as the romantic developments. As it is, it packs quite some interesting details and a lot of promise for a few more tales set in this world. However, as a standalone story, it is *just* an entertaining, fast and light read. One that is worth to be picked up for sure, but one that will make you crave for more at the same time.
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