Breaking Point
3 Stars

FBI negotiator Max Bhagat excels at his job, but when it comes to his relationship with Gina Vitagliano, he just can't seem to get it right. When he receives the devastating news that Gina has been killed in a terrorist attack, Max is determined to identify the body and get justice for her. However, Max is in for another shock as the dead woman is not Gina, and she along with Molly Anderson, has been abducted. Soon Max finds himself working with Grady Morant, a.k.a "Jones" to rescue the women they love.

To be honest, this installment is very disappointing.

The pacing in the first half is slow with an excessive number of flashback scenes. Not only are there too many but they cover two different time periods, and all of the information could have been summarized in a prologue.

While the pace improves at the halfway mark, the plot becomes overly convoluted with several confusing and inexplicable twists and turns. The resolution is also completely far-fetched and lacks believability.

In terms of the romance, the focus is on two couples, Gina and Max as well as Molly and Jones (from book #4). I had been looking forward to the resolution of Gina and Max's storyline, but it simply does not live up to its potential. The details provided about Max's past, which may explain his reticence, are superficial and never really provide any insight into his mindset. Moreover, the intense chemistry that characterized their connection in previous books is lacking here.

With regard to Molly and Jones, they never resonated with me as a couple so their reunion and the challenges they face are ok but not awe inspiring.

Overall, not one of the better additions to the series although the ending is quite sweet. ( )

Glad to see Max and Gina get their happy ending, heh, but found the flashbacks difficult to follow. Where in the previous books, the flashbacks dealt with the secondary or tertiary love stories of the WWII vets, here it felt clunky and filler-ish. I'd have preferred memory sequences rather than timeline jumping. Gina and Max's troubled history was already established in the previous books, and while I appreciated getting to know them a bit better, the book was overly long.

I'm kind of over this series, but will commend Ms. Brockmann on her savvy business skills. I'll keep reading because I really, really want to see Jules get his own happy ending. I feel like I can't skip over the next books because I'll lose more of Jules' setup. ( )

This is one of my favorites from the series. Max finally gives in to his feelings for Gina. The scenes before he realizes that she is still alive are very intense. They also set him up to give in to his feelings for her as he realizes that life is short and love is not to be turned away. I also love the conclusion of Grady and Molly's story. I love Grady. His life is pretty heart rending and he deserves his HEA.

The suspense part is well done and believable and Jules is on the top of his game here. I absolutely love him. Brockmann has taken a character who could have become a stereotype and turned him into the most well rounded and charming and capable character in the series. ( )

I hope for more from the book that focused on Max Bhagat and Gina.

Nevertheless, always enjoy Suzanne Brockmann and her Troubleshooters series has been a blast.

I completely forgot that I had met Jones and Molly in a previous book - which one was it??!! Set in Indonesia. Didn't realise it till near the end. They were terrific in that previous Troubleshooters novel and given that, they were definitely "underdone" in this - should have been so much more lush and magnanimous! a missed opportunity! ( )

I've been waiting for quite awhile to get to the story of FBI agent Max Bhagat and the much younger Gina Vitagliano. The two met in 2001's Over the Edge when Gina was beaten and raped by terrorists aboard a hijacked plane. Arriving at work one day, silent, straight-laced, Max receives a piece of horrible news. Gina's name is on the list of those killed by a terrorist bomb in Hamburg, Germany. Devastated and sorry for all the things he should have said to her, Max travels to the scene of the attack, only to discover the dead woman is not Gina.

He traces Gina back to an African AIDS camp, where Gina was doing volunteer work. One of the other volunteers is Molly Anderson, a character we met in Out of Control. Molly headed to Africa after losing her love, David Jones (aka Grady Morant), a former Special Forces soldier who's wanted dead or alive by a Chinese criminal.

Quite a bit of the story is told in flashbacks from a few months before the bombing attack, set in the AIDS camp in Kenya, where Gina went after she left Max. In those chapters, we mostly see the secondary storyline, which features Molly and Jones. We see Jones show up under a fake name and be reunited with Molly after many years apart, with Gina looking on and helping. There are also an extensive use of flashbacks to a time when Max was in the hospital. I think the author was using them to establish Max's personality in withdrawing from emotion, but I felt like it really slowed down the story narrative.

Jules has a minor storyline about his ongoing recovery from an emotionally abusive relationship and his devotion to Max and Gina. That must mean Jules's primary story will be coming up soon.

When we get to the point where the story continues in the present time, the tone changes a bit and the book turns into a more action-driven story. I really enjoyed it and was glad that a couple of my favorite pair of characters finally got their happy ending. ( )