Deeper than Need

Walker’s first novel-length Secrets & Shadows installment (following a series of digital novellas) is an uneasy blend of suspense and romance that never quite jells. Contractor and former youth pastor Noah Benningfield has spent 20 years recovering from the traumatic disappearance and presumed death of his first love, Lana. When Trinity Ewing and her young son, Micah, move to Madison, Ind. and buy a purportedly haunted house, Noah agrees to help them refurbish it. Noah and have an immediate visceral response to each other, but desire is delayed by a variety of complications, including the discovery of a corpse—which might be Lana’s—under Trinity’s rotting pantry floor. The story is hampered by overly deliberate pacing and unnecessarily contrived concealment of various elements, and not even the regular interjection of steamy romantic scenarios can overcome the lack of suspense. Agent: Irene Goodman, Irene Goodman Literary Agency. (June)