High Heat (Nikki Heat) Hardcover – October 25, 2016

Where to begin? So much was disappointing about this book: the writing was not nearly as good or as polished as in the previous books of this series; two unrealated plots ran throughout the book, making the entire novel disjointed; the author renders Rook and Heat mere caricatures of formerly well-developed fictional characters; action scenes were not believable; dialogue was second-rate, uncharacteristic of the original characters, and quite tedious to read; editing and continuity didn't appear to be important to the publisher or the author; the writing was, generally, not very good.Apparently, the current entertainment industry trend is to propagandize for 1)Islam 2)liberal political candidates 3) minority races 4) gun control. This book seems to have chosen the first two to propagandize in the guise of storytelling. It succeeds in neither good propaganda, nor good storytelling. As with most artistic media used to forward an agenda, the art suffers, but in this novel, more than usual. There is little art in this book.Whoever wrote the previous books in this series either did not write this one, or had a severely debilitating stroke but made his deadline nevertheless. Most likely, however, the author of the previous, well-written novels in the series is no longer writing them and the contract was handed to someone who aspires to, but cannot reach, the abilities/talent of his/her predecessor.It appears that the only creative notions this author could muster was using the well-worn terrorist theme with a nonsensical twist passing blame onto former US military personnel and a conservative presidential candidate (a very thinly veiled attack on the current one in real life). As if this isn't uncreative enough, the author decides to resurrect Nikki's long-dead mother (yawn). And to firm our suspicion that this author hasn't got an original thought of his own, he throws in countless, unsubtle references to the Castle television show, as if doing this was something clever and entertaining. As Nikki leaves Rook because she has to chase her mother down somehow, I decided to never purchase another book in this series. Been there, saw that on TV. I don't do regurges.I had the distinct feeling while reading this book that the author found the entire project a joke that would provide at least one more round of income on the reputation of previous novels in the series. It may well do so. Fool me once, shame on me; however, you will not fool me again. All good things come to an end, and this book definitely marks the end of the Nikki Heat series, if inferior work like "High Heat" is all the publisher can produce for the franchise.

The story makes the same fatal flaw that the TV series did - turned Jameson Rook (Richard Castle) into a school boyish wiseguy who doesn't seem to know when to either say something grown up or just keep his mouth shut. And the ending was awful. After spending an entire book telling us how devoted Niki Heat is to her lover/husband - at the end she decides to walk out on him and her marriage because she thinks all she alone can work out her demons regarding her mysterious mother and her mysterious mother's mysterious death - proving that Heat has absolutely NO CLUE what being married means, no concept of the two shall become One, no real respect for her 'brilliant' husband problem solving skills and no reverence for the bond they should be sharing. I was one of the few fans who stuck it out with the TV series till the bitter end and so far I've read all of the books. But the author(s) have veered so far away from original concept of two strong, smart people coming together to solve crimes that I don't know if I will read another one of these books.

I would rate this a zero stars, if possible, because of the ending. Season 8 of Castle was a disaster. It would be logical to assume that the writer of this book was also involved in the writing or producing of Castle's last season. As noted by another reviewer, Nikki Heat's mother was killed by Petar Matic not Tyler Wynn. The basic plot for the primary ISIS story was quite transparent. The storyline concerning Nikki's mother was there only as a setup for the next book. It also helped make the book a little longer.

I love the Nikki Heat series but this new book in the series is riddled with errors. In the first 12 chapters I have read there is a serious plot hole and the wrong reference in a scene.In the first four chapters the ME Lauren Parry tells Nikki Heat she can't tell her much about the victim except maybe she flossed. But how can she tell that when the victim is missing her head? And they haven't found it yet.Also, later on Jameson Rook comes into to interrogate a suspect and he gives the guy this big wide smile. The narrative states the suspect returns the smile to Heat, when it is Rook who is in the room.Just shoddy writing and I am highly disappointed the book wasn't edited better.

Another solid entry in this series. Not spectacular, not terrible.There is a fair bit of authorial intrusion where Castle tells the readers things the POV character couldn’t know. Example: In one place he tells us Nikki isn’t aware of the character walking alongside her. But since we are (supposedly) in Nikki’s POV, we can’t ‘know’ what she isn’t aware is happening.There were plenty of production errors in this book. The most glaring one: 'Breaks' are interruptions in the continuity of things. 'Brakes' are things that stop cars, trucks, trains, and planes. Getting it wrong once can happen. Getting it wrong twice is inexcusable.And there is no such thing as a Cadillac Escalade with an extended cab. The Escalade is a full-sized SUV built on the same chassis platform as the Chevrolet Suburban and GMC Yukon. And the Escalade Sport Utility Truck comes only with a 4-door cab. A two-second Google search would have prevented this blatant mistake.The ending here feels a bit rushed and the follow-up drags a bit too long.This book is another example of Amazon amazing ability to tell me on their website how many pages are in a book but amazing inability to number the pages in the download of that book. If you can page number some books, Amazon, why can’t you page number them all?

I had been looking forward to the release of this book for some time having read all previous which I would happily give 4 or 5 stars. However while I enjoyed parts of this book, overall It left me disappointed. The killer/plot was pretty obvious from the the start and not enough side characters to leave options. They kept Nikki and Rook apart more than they should. The mother twist I felt wasn't the right way to take the storyline. The action, in all ways, was lacking compared to previous books but I was still entertained up to the last 5 pages. As a Castle fan and knowing what a disaster the season 8 storyline was, I looked to the books, not expecting them to take the turn that proved so bad for the show itself. Unfortunately thIs was the only part of the plot I hadn't seen coming and it left me deflated, irritated and questioning if I should even buy future books. I agree with an earlier review that we may be experiencing a different writer and I can't believe they didn't learn from the response to the Caste S8 storyline and do a rewrite of parts of this book before publication.

I was disappointed in this book. I read through the others pretty fast, being thoroughly entertained with the plot twists, the love story and the kick-ass woman who found her way through many a scrape. I figured out quickly who was behind the plot, which then makes it difficult to keep reading. The murderer of Nikki's mom was wrong, as per your previous books the actual deed was done by someone else. There are lots of mistakes in this book too. I don't usually pay attention to mistakes knowing that it is difficult to get it 100%, but after the 10th mistake I felt I was turning into a proofreader. So knowing the killer, figuring out the plot, proofreading etc I thought I would just put it down and read later - which was something I had difficult doing in the first lot of books.

Complete tosh of course, and I still am amused by the fiction/fact links with the Castle tv show, now so rightly cancelled after the deplorable 8th season, but written with crackling pace and a chatty style which I found highly enjoyable, just debit one star for the final chapter, a diversion this entertaining book didn’t needRecommended

Had me interested up until the last two pages. As our American friends would say "Way to go to kill a franchise".I won't be ordering the next book. Having destroyed the series the it would seem the self destruction is complete.

This book like the others in the Nikki Heat series was an enjoyable and easy read. The stories have a number of similaries to the Castle T.V. series.