Sizzle and Burn-Jayne Ann Krentz

Sizzle and Burn
Jayne Ann Krentz
Putnam, Jan 207, $24.95, 368 pp.
ISBN: 9780399154454

After her aunt died, Raine Tallentyre returned to Shelbyville, Washington to arrange to have Vella’s house sold. Raine is a psychic, a clairvoyant who hears the voices of evil people who have touched something she has touched. That is how Raine knows that a young woman is locked in a padlocked closet in her aunt’s basement. When the police arrive and open the door she is still alive. The victim tells the authorities the man thought she was a witch and all witches had to die.

Parapsychic Zack Jones is a private investigator for the Arcane Society, an organization dedicated to doing research on psychic powers; he is not repulsed by Raine’s powers because he has visions too. The Arcane Society is in a fight with Nightshade, an organization of criminal psychics, who stole the original formula of the founder of the Arcane Society to enhance paranormal abilities. The drawback is that every dose the person takes leads to insanity and finally suicide. Zack wants Raine to help him locate missing scientist Dr. Lawrence Quinn who was working on the formula to enhance para powers without going insane. The missing scientist was last scene in Oriana near the home of Raine’s late aunt. Zacl wants to rescue the researcher or deal with him if he is a traitor and she wants to find out if her aunt was murdered. Together they make a great team in and out of the bedroom.

Jayne Anne Krentz has written another best seller that is going to the top of the New York Times bestseller list. This latest Arcane Society novel is full of action, intrigue, romance and double agents who keep the protagonists busy trying to figure out who they are. The support cast is quirky, a Krentz trademark and add a degree of beauty to a fast paced thriller. Readers get a fascinating inside look at the Arcane Society.

Harriet Klausner