Adult Review - Tropical Target - Christian Contemporary Suspense

Guide to categories: Adult Review – review of books for adults – may or may not be appropriate for a school library

Links in this post may be affiliate links. Purchases made using these links will not cost you more but may pay me an affiliate fee. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and related sites. Thank you for using my links.

About the Book

Book: Tropical Target

Author: Jennifer Pierce

Genre: Christian Contemporary Suspense

Release Date: September 26, 2023

Being accused of murdering a client isn’t good for business.

Tropical islands are popular for destination weddings. But Le Cadeau Île won’t be a popular destination for long if Detective Noa Tanielu can’t find out who is responsible for a ring of thefts occurring during weddings. When the thefts escalate to the murder of a bridezilla, the most likely suspect is the new wedding photographer.

Wedding photographer Haley Marsh moved to the island to nurse her broken heart and start over after being dumped two days before her wedding. When she’s moved from the suspect list to the target list, a little white lie leads to a fake engagement. With Haley’s connections to the wedding business, it’s clear the key to solving this case lies in keeping up the charade.

Noa and Haley must navigate the investigation and Noa’s mother’s attempts to make the engagement all too real…if they survive that is.

Take a trip to the Suamalie Islands where palm trees sway, the sand and sea pulse with life, and the people will steal your heart.

Click here to get your copy!

My Adult Review

Pierce, Jennifer. Tropical Target. 2023.
Suamalie Islands year one book eight

Tropical Target is part of the Sumalie Island series of stories. The stories are independent of each other and do not need to be read in order. Within the series there is some overlap with characters in other books and with characters in the Independence Island series. However, I did not notice any character overlap with the latest addition to the series – Tropical Target. Even though the story takes place on the same island as a previous book, there were no characters I recognized. Jennifer Pierce has definitely written a stand alone novel. I believe this is the first book she has written for either of the series created by Celebrate Lit Publishing.

Tropical Target is a murder mystery – not a light romance you might expect if you’ve read other books in the two series. There is romance but it is a murder that brings the characters together. Haley is a photographer who moved to the Suamalie Islands while recovering from a broken relationship. She is the photographer at the wedding where the bride is murdered. Noa is a Samoan on the island’s police force. He is the first police officer on the scene of the murder. The relationship starts with a lot of friction between the two characters but as they work together and there are attempts on Haley’s life, they grow to be friends.

Spoiler – The book ends with a proposal so I hope that the characters of this story will show up in future books in the Suamalile Island series.

While there Tropical Target is an adult contemporary romance, I do not remember anything in the book (other than the murder) which might prohibit the book from being added to a K-12 Christian school library. High schoolers would probably enjoy the book.

I received a complimentary copy of Tropical Target. This is my honest review.

About the Author – Jennifer Pierce

Jennifer Pierce currently lives in Arkansas with her husband and two children. Her debut novel, Hidden Danger, is a 2019 Selah Award winner, and her second novel, Expecting Danger is a 2019 Selah award finalist. Her third novel, Deadly Connection released on October 20, 2020. Giving Grace, a contemporary romance Christmas novella released on November 13, 2020. She is a member of American Christian Fiction Writers and River Valley Writers.

More from Jennifer Pierce

I am so excited to be writing for the Suamalie Island series. Writing books set on tropical islands is so much fun. I knew going into Tropical Target that I wanted Noa to be a detective, but I wasn’t so sure on what type of occupation Haley needed. What was something that she could do for both the tourists and those that made the islands their home?

Then I remembered when my grandmother died, one of my aunts took all her photos and scanned them into the computer and made CDs and gave them to the rest of the family. I thought that would be a fantastic job for Haley. She could be a photographer who shoots destination weddings and special events for tourists and locals, and she could also travel the islands and make keepsakes for the locals. I expanded it even further to allow her to make copies of some of the photographs and sell them to tourists as authentic photographs of the islands. So, that’s how Seas the Moment was created.

The next thing I had to figure out was how to make Noa and Haley’s paths cross. What better way than for him to accuse her of murder? I wanted to pit the two of them against each other but then force them to work together. Kind of an enemies to more fake engagement trope.

Once those things were in place it was just a matter of weaving the story together. There’s suspense, romance, faith, and a few witty comebacks in the mix. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.