The Taste of Fear by Jeremy Bates.

The Taste of Fear is a thriller set in Africa, where American movie star Scarlett Cox and her husband, hotel tycoon Salvador Brazza have a short holiday break with many problems.

I have NOT read any of Jeremy Bates novels before and started reading The Taste of Fear with open eyes. What a lovely surprise I got from reading this book. Jeremy creates such great suspense and tension, your alarm bells are constantly ringing with the next threat on Scarlett or Salvador. Not only that but the reader gets the story from the assassin and the terrorist who are on their trail. So you know how the net is tightening around Scarlett and Salvador but they are blissfully enjoying their holiday in Tanzania. Then Scarlett and Salvador become involved in plots against them in this fast paced thriller that chills with suspense and tension.

I found the writing quality in The Taste of Fear to be top class. There is a very wide use of vocabulary and quite often I had to pull up the dictionary on my Kindle to be sure, for example “spelunker”. I loved how it was not just a plot driven novel but had lots of background and explanations about the detail of what was going on in the moment. All this extra information about how things are done, brought so much added value to my enjoyment of this book. Some of the characters were Mai-Mai rebels - and a quick search on the internet proves these people do exist in the Congo and Jeremy has truly done his research and has not made the bad guys up from his imagination. The whole story was told in a very adult way.

I liked the characters that Scarlett and Salvador met along the way. Jeremy knows how to develop colourful characters and no character became a drag. I liked the dialogue between ALL the characters and enjoyed the dark humour said between them. I really liked how this book was not politically correct and that Jeremy felt comfortable including snips that really made me chuckle, for example…

It made her wonder what early man had thought when he came down from the trees and was confronted with this new and alien world full of opportunity and danger.

The baboons watched the Land Rover pass with their sparkling black eyes, unalarmed, likely used to seeing their distant cousins come this way.

But a lot of these well-armed government-backed guerilla groups became consumed with their unbridled power, ultimately raping and pillaging and participating in rampant cannibalism, with a special taste for the local pygmy population.

“Not bad for an old man,” Zamir said, rolling his shoulders to get the feeling back in his arms. “Not bad for a Jew,” Fitzgerald shot back.

… I was really impressed with The Taste of Fear and thought it was an OUTSTANDING read that gets the top score of 5 stars from me. I became engaged, engrossed and entertained by this story. However, I will NOT look at a barbecue the same way again!