‘Deserted Echo’ by Linda Kay Silva
Author: Anna Furtado
November 26, 2014
Deserted Echo takes us on another heart-pumping journey in the Echo series. Echo Branson, her family of supernaturals, and technical-guru-and-sometimes-security-person Sal, are in Mexico for a vacation. What begins as a relaxing time on a Mexican beach turns into a tense drama filled with characters with ulterior motives and warped objectives. In spite of the vacation, Echo has decided to combine some business with pleasure, and the result turns out to be devastating to her and her friends and family.
Still reeling from profound loss from the previous book in the series (Echo’s Revenge), Echo is at a crossroads and everything is up for grabs. She has the safety and well-being of her new troupe of Supers to consider, the overtures of an old love must be resolved, grief must be overcome, and friends must be reevaluated.
Echo chooses to make this her last journalistic assignment before devoting her life to teaching and mentoring, using part of her vacation time to pursue an interview with a member of the cartel who has offered up a tell-all meeting. What ensues is not what Echo expected. After spending time with the kids, she goes off to interview her source only to find danger lurking around every corner. Luckily, some of her friends that she thought she left back home are close by and their fierce loyalty and protectiveness is tested by the evil they encounter. The covert operation to protect Echo and her kids is exposed and the group gets enmeshed in their own problems, which eventually involves them in Echo’s difficulties. In what becomes a tangled web of malevolence, mayhem, and imprisonment, Echo and friends must fight against their foes again and again. Even “firefly” Cinder has a hard time defending herself against the surprises in store for them.
Under pretense of exposing the cartel to American readers, the Mexican crime boss has a newsflash for Echo, and it isn’t anything she has imagined. As one secret after another is revealed to her, Echo realizes just how much trouble she and her charges are in and she must figure out a way, not only to escape, but to stop the wickedness in its tracks. However, opposing powers prove to be no match for Echo and her friends—at least for a while.
Deserted Echo is jam-packed with pressure and malevolence. The characters try to assert their strength and use their best efforts to pry Echo and her friends from the steely hand of the man who would destroy them all—and for much of the story it is very uncertain who will triumph.
Silva has given us another fast-paced, heart pumping, tension-filled Echo Branson story bursting with the fight of good versus evil we have come to know and love. The “bad guys” are really bad—and filled with surprises that astonish Echo and rock her to her core. nd the “good guys” have hearts that remain pure to the end, regardless of past history. Reader, beware: this story contains graphic torture made more unsettling because the incident is a little too close to the characters we love. The copyediting could have used a stronger final hand as several sentences throughout the story made no sense and seemed to hint at writing that had been changed from one sentence to another and were not edited properly, throwing the reader out of the story. However, Silva’s characters are so compelling and endearing, that fans will probably excuse this editing faux pas.
In this energetic and sometimes frightening tale, there is little time to breathe between scenes, so thrill seekers will relish the adrenalin pumping nature of the story. Join in Echo’s continuing drive toward self-realization and her push to combat the forces of evil—if you dare!
Deserted Echo
By Linda Kay Silva
Sapphire Books
Paperback, 9781939062635, 310 pp.
August 2014
