Title: Lights and Sirens
Series: Emergency Services: Book Two
Author: Lisa Henry
Publisher: Self-Published
Length: 231 Pages
Category: Contemporary
At a Glance: While there was often a bit too much technical information presented in the story, the connection between Matt and Hayden was realistic and gritty, indicative of the jobs they both loved. This one will definitely keep me watching for more in this series.
Reviewed By: Sammy
Blurb: Paramedic Hayden Kinsella is single and the life of the party. He likes driving fast and saving lives, and he doesn’t do relationships—he does hookups. Except he wouldn’t hook up with copper Matt Deakin if he were the last guy on the planet. Hayden thinks the feeling is mutual . . . until clearing the air leads to a drunken one-night stand, which leads to something neither of them was expecting: a genuine connection.
Police officer Matt Deakin moved to Townsville to take care of his elderly grandfather. In between keeping an eye on Grandad, renovating his house, and the demands of his job, he somehow finds himself in a tentative relationship with Hayden and very slowly gets to know the damaged guy beneath the happy-go-lucky persona.
But the stressors of shift work, fatigue, and constant exposure to trauma threaten to tear Hayden and Matt apart before they’ve even found their footing together. In the high-pressure lives of emergency services workers, it turns out it’s not the getting together part that’s hard, it’s the staying together.
Review: Lisa Henry has released the second novel in her Emergency Services series entitled Lights And Sirens. The author ensured this one can definitely be read as a standalone by creating an entirely new cast featuring a paramedic names Hayden Kinsella and a police officer, Matt Deakin. The two men appear to hate each other, mainly due to what we will find out was a misunderstanding over a speeding ticket
Hayden was, in actuality, flirting with the handsome officer writing him a ticket, but Matt failed to see it as anything other than an attempt to have the fine go away. For weeks after, both men have a simmering dislike for each other which comes to a boil one night during parties both are attending. When they realize it was a real miscommunication that left them unhappy with each other, they begin a slow-moving relationship that neither of them understands nor can really label. Hayden only knows that he is not the best boyfriend material, while Matt begins to gradually understand that the lack of trust Hayden often exhibits for others doesn’t really extend to him. But, he does recognize fear, and Hayden has that in spades when it comes to letting his guard down and allowing himself to fall in love.
With exacting precision, writing various ambulance and police calls that shows a real understanding of the stresses community service workers undergo, author Lisa Henry unfolds a slow-burning love story between two wary men. Sometimes the pacing of the story got bogged down in procedural rhetoric, but even then, the tentative emotional bond that was developing between Hayden and Matt was obvious. The strength of this novel lay in the vast amount of trauma that both Matt and Hayden accept as simply part of their job. The physical and mental toll it takes on both of them was certainly enough to deep-six any kind of partnership beyond a work related one. However, the author carefully nurtures what little time these two men have by allowing for raw feelings to be a part of their interactions.
Speaking his truth is particularly hard for Hayden. Having grown up in foster care, he is used to being nothing more than a wayfarer in life, constantly shuffled off to another home when his foster parents have had enough. Hayden is emotionally damaged, and Matt is exceedingly patient when it comes to hanging tough in the face of Hayden’s often unreasonable anger and fear. Matt tries to be realistic about the fate of their tumultuous relationship, but, in his heart, he really cares for Hayden and wants them to work.
Lights and Sirens explores how difficult life can be when you are trying to be vulnerable to your partner but maintain a rigid distance from the stress of a highly emotional job. While there was often a bit too much technical information presented in the story, the connection between Matt and Hayden was realistic and gritty, indicative of the jobs they both loved. This one will definitely keep me watching for more in this series.
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