🧡HERO MINE (Linear Tactical: Oak Creek 5) by Janie Crouch🧡

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ABOUT THE BOOK: Release Date May 4, 2025

“Survival is always the most important thing.”

You don’t get far in Oak Creek, Wyoming, home of Linear Tactical and its gruff and rugged heroes, without hearing that motto.

Free-spirited Joy Davis—opposite of gruff and rugged—heard the slogan her whole life and generally met it with a roll of her eyes.

Until the night she was attacked and left for dead.

He’s always been her anchor. But now, she’s his reason to fight.

Bear Bollinger, the Oak Creek’s rough-hewn mechanic, has been Joy’s protector and confidant for years, waiting for the right time to make his move.

Watching her struggle in the aftermath of the attack breaks something inside him. Determined to see her smile again, he steps in to help her rebuild her shattered confidence.

But Oak Creek has danger closing in.

When a new threat begins to stalk the town, Bear must protect the woman who means everything to him, even as Joy fights to reclaim her life and face a danger unlike anything she’s ever known.

••••••

REVIEW: HERO MINE is the is the fifth instalment in Janie Crouch’s contemporary, adult LINEAR TACTICAL: OAK CREEK romantic suspense series, a second-generation spin off from the author’s LINEAR TACTICAL series. This is thirty-two year old mechanic Thomas ‘Bear’ Bollinger, and twenty-four year old waitress/ baker Joy Davis’ story line. HERO MINE can be read as a stand alone without any difficulty. Any important information from the previous story lines is revealed where necessary but I recommend reading HERO’S HEART for backstory and cohesion. Bear is (Finn Bollinger’s Son-EAGLE)

Told from dual omniscient third person perspectives (Bear and Joy) HERO MINE focuses on Joy Davis’ struggle with her recovery in the aftermath of an attack one month earlier. When her best friend Sloane was kidnapped (Hero’s Heart), and Joy was attacked trying to protect her friend, our heroine has struggled to move on with her life including a lack of emotional healing, and a physical distance. Bear Bollinger has been in love with Joy Davis since she turned eighteen but Bear struggled with their age difference, and the resulting spiral from his time spent in Iraq but Bear is determined to help Joy in her recovery, a recovery Joy struggles to accept, or move on with her life but all is not well in Oak Creek, someone is stealing junk from the local businesses, and Joy gets the feeling she is being watched.

The world building focuses on recovery and acceptance as the whole town knows Joy is struggling in the wake of the attack. Often refusing help, Joy begins to spiral, and Bear is determined to stop the mayhem that is controlling her life.

The relationship between Joy and Bear is a friends to lovers. Years earlier Bear rejected Joy’s attempts at seduction, and in doing so, drove a wedge in their friendship but Bear struggled and continues to struggle with their age difference, and his need to protect the woman with whom he has fallen in love. The $ex scenes are intimate and passionate without the use of over the top, sexually graphic language and text.

Once again, there is a large ensemble cast of familiar, dynamic and determined secondary and supporting characters including several from the original Linear Tactical series : Sloane and Callum, Finn and Charlotte aka Charlie; several townies, tourists, and reporter Daniel Fletcher.

HERO MINE is a story of recovery and healing, family and friendships, acceptance and love. The character driven premise is edgy, encouraging and engaging; the romance is seductive and impassioned; the character are desperate and charismatic.

Reading Order and Previous Reviews
Hero Unbound
Hero’s Flight
Hero’s Prize
Hero’s Heart

Copy supplied for review

Reviewed by Sandy

USA TODAY bestselling author Janie Crouch writes what she loves to read: passionate romantic suspense. She is a winner and/or finalist of multiple romance literary awards including the Golden Quill Award for Best Romantic Suspense, the National Reader’s Choice Award, and the coveted RITA© Award by the Romance Writers of America.

Janie recently relocated with her husband and their four teenagers to Germany (due to her husband’s job as support for the U.S. Military), after living in Virginia for nearly 20 years. When she’s not listening to the voices in her head (and even when she is), she enjoys engaging in all sorts of crazy adventures (200-mile relay races; Ironman Triathlons, treks to Mt. Everest Base Camp) traveling, and movies of all kinds.

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