Prolific romantic thriller author Sandra Brown has come up with another rattling good read full of twists and turns that entertain, despite some thin characters and stilted dialogue. 

By CLAIRE SCHNACKENBERG

 “If I was guessing, I’d say he has a mean streak a mile wide. He keeps it under control. But if he ever let it loose, look out.” The comment comes from a minor character, but with it, Sandra Brown clearly sets the tone.

Mean Streak looks at the tenuous nature of trust and truth, with enough twists and turns along the way to keep you questioning who’s to blame until the end. 

Bestselling American author Sandra Brown fits Mean Streak into her impressive run of romantic thriller novels. Starting out in the '80s, Brown has written more than 70 books and proved she has the clarity and flair to stick around in the world of romantic fiction. Mean Streak is no exception.

The novel follows paediatrician Dr Emory Charbonneau as she grapples with her egocentric husband Jeff and an unhappy marriage. Emory channels her passion into running and organising marathons.

While training in the North Carolina mountains, her plans go abruptly sideways and she wakes up injured in a mysterious cabin. From there Emory’s problems only get worse. 

The extreme weather traps Emory in the cabin with an unnamed, tall, handsome stranger with dubious intentions. Her husband, Jeff, alerts the police that she is missing, but they suspect he has more of a role in Emory’s disappearance than he lets on.

Meanwhile, Special Agent Jack Connell from the FBI searches for a lost fugitive, hunting down any leads he can get his hands on.

Brown throws in twist after twist, keeping you captivated by slowly unravelling the mystery surrounding the unnamed man in the cabin. Throwing in a dramatic love story and questionable motives, Brown keeps up the action.

On the whole, Brown writes with clarity, but some of her dialogue comes off over-formal and stilted, particularly between Emory and her stereotyped husband Jeff.

Jeff’s character is unexplored and barely branches out from under his "unsatisfied husband" umbrella. But Jeff is not the only cut-and-paste character who crops up. A pair of yokel thugs make an appearance, but it is their family who offers some depth to the story.

Special Agent Jack Connell lives up to his similarly named famous colleagues from other works – Jack Crawford, Jack Malone and Jack Taliente – as a gritty FBI agent determined to catch the bad guys. He offers some bright sparks of humour in the novel and throws in a few curveballs to keep you guessing.

Emory shares her adventure and her fast-paced romance with grace, though her character is a little colourless and one-dimensional.

The author lives up to her standard for romantic thriller, but sadly doesn’t go much further than that.

But is that what we’re really looking for here? As with her other novels, Brown provides a nice, clean, twisty world to escape to for a few hours and a satisfying read.

Mean Streak is available in bookstores and on Kindle, the App Store and Google Play.