I’m continuing on with my to-be-read challenge. This month, I decided to focus on finishing books that have been sitting around half finished. First up, Stephanie Tyler’s Risking It All.

What is it about extreme surfer John “Cash” Cashman? Ambitious documentarian Rina Calhoun has filmed risk-taking sports enthusiasts before, but she’s never made a private tape of one of these bad boys. . . . And it turns out the daring, hot movie version’s got nothing on the real thing!

But Rina’s X-treme documentary is turning into an X-asperating docudrama, since Cash won’t sign her release form. No paper from him, no big break for her.

Cash wants to help the fiery little number behind the lens, but he can’t because his secret life as a navy SEAL has him deep undercover. Yet as Rina stumbles into the line of fire, all bets are quckly off. He’s risking everything to save her. But will it be enough?

I set this book aside several months ago through no fault of its own. Sometimes I skim ahead to see what will happen, and then I quit reading because then I know what happens. It’s stupid, I know. But there it is, and that’s what happened here. This month, I figured enough time had passed that I could start fresh. I’m glad I picked it up again because it’s a fantastic story: 4.5 out of 5.

The back cover blurb offers a decent summary of the story. What it doesn’t tell you is that the book jumps right into the story with compelling characters and a plot that keeps you reading. In fact, it was so engrossing that I skipped ahead to make sure everything works out all right. You know how that turned out . . .

I tend to read romances for the hero. Cash is awesome, but I also have to comment on how much I loved the heroine as well. Rina is easy to relate to, and I sympathized with her thoughts about her job and her questions about how she would handle being with a man whose job put him in danger. Cash and Rina seem like real people, and I really enjoyed reading about them.

Tyler offers a fresh voice in military romance, and I’m excited that I have her next book already.