Reviewed by Chris
TITLE: Hawk in the Rowan
SERIES: The Rowan Harbor Cycle #4
AUTHOR: Sam Burns
PUBLISHER: Self-Published
LENGTH: 158 pages
RELEASE DATE: May 3, 2018
BLURB:
Devon Murphy has been back in Rowan Harbor for three months. He’s taken on a host of new responsibilities, and is in a serious relationship for the first time in his life. He loves the town and its inhabitants, but it’s starting to feel like too much for the former drifter.
Now there’s a storm on the horizon, and it doesn’t seem like things are going to slow down and let him catch his breath. A blizzard is brewing, and three people have gone missing in the woods south of town. Devon needs to find them before time runs out.
This book is the fourth of nine in The Rowan Harbor Cycle, not a standalone. Devon and Wade will return in book seven for their HEA.
REVIEW:
Sam Burns is back with the fourth book in the Rowan Harbor Cycle, and I’m happy to be back to review it. 😀
With Hawk in the Rowan the cycle has reset itself and we are reading again about the first two MCs we got to know in this series: Devon and Wade. And while I’m sure everyone in Rowan Harbor would like to go back to their normal slow existence after the danger from the last book came to a conclusion, sadly that is not to be the case. For Devon is predicting a severe snow storm just over the horizon, and with Devon’s inability to lie, that means the town needs to bunker down and hope to bear out the storm in one piece. Unfortunately…things do not go as planned.
Like I said up top, I am really glad to be back in charge of the reviews for this series. Each book has been so enjoyable so far, and I would be sad to say goodbye any time soon to the pleasure of reading these stories, or of letting you guys know just what to expect out of them. So without further ado…what did I think?
Pretty much what I have thought about every other book so far. They are incredibly enjoyable, with great characters, and while I find the whole series to be building up fantastically, on the whole each book rest well on its own–with only a few flaws that don’t impact my overall enjoyment of the story.
I can’t say which of the three pairs are my favorite MCs, but I think Devon and Wade kinda get bonus points for being my entry point into Rowan Harbor and its many wonderful characters and stories. Clearly this book is not the endpoint for them, so they are not yet to their HEA, but I was glad to see some growth in their relationship in this second of their stories. Devon is still dealing with his pick-up-and-flee tendencies, and Wade–which we sadly don’t get a lot of in this story–is still a little hesitant to do anything that might spook the man. But they are clearly falling for each other, and I really like the fact that giving them time to grow as people and a couple over these nine book–three of which are focused mostly on them–allows the space for it to feel more real to the readers.
I will say though that the pacing in this story is a bit off. What feels like should have been the climax of the story was over and done with by the 70% mark, and it left the remaining third of the story feeling a bit drawn out and uneven. Everything up to that point had a decently fast pace that kept the plot in motion, but after that it kinda felt a bit drifty. I’m not sure if it would have worked with the plot, but maybe moving the scene with Oak near the end to earlier would have helped a bit with the pacing problem. I think we needed that information for what is going to happen over the course of then next five books, but it having that on top of all of the rest of the denouement stretched the end out a bit too much. I’ve only read the story once, though, so I’m not sure if it would have created more problems to move it. We’ll have to see what I come up with the next time I get a chance to reread this book.
Outside of the pacing, though, I found this book to be a fun read. I think I might have liked book three the best so far, but coming back to Devon and Wade was nice. I will also say that I was a bit worried that the way this series was structured was going to make it hard to reconnect with each couple on each cycle, but that didn’t turn out to be a problem at all. The way the three pairs are integrated as secondary characters in the stories that are not their own actually keeps you in close enough contact that even though time has passed between each pair’s story, you don’t really feel it. And the way the plot of one book directly leads into or is a catalyst for the next one is very well done. By the end of this book I was all ready to jump into Sean and Jesse’s story. Hopefully it will not be a long wait.
RATING: 
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