From the moment a total stranger thrusts her baby into Kieran's arms in a street in New York, this story is off to non stop action with twists and turns that keep a readers head spinning.
The romance between Kieran and Craig is sweet with a whole host of supporting characters who aid and impede the search for the baby mother. Every time it seems that our crime fighting duo is getting to the truth it disappears in front of them. Clearly they have a mole.
While the story sags in places overall it's a great story.

Review featured at www.books-n-kisses.com

I honestly am not sure why I keep requesting this series. Other than it is Heather Graham I have no reason to pick it out. I have not been a fan of this series from the beginning but I keep trying it. And again this just didn’t strike me.

I am a HUGE fan of Graham’s and a HUGER (yeah I know that is not a word) fan of the Krewe of Hunters series. Maybe if I didn’t have those books to compare to I would enjoy this one more but it is hard to not see exactly what is missing from this series to the other.

I can imagine fans of Graham’s that do not like the Krewe series might find this series worth the read. And knowing me I will request the next one too. But 3 stars is the best I can do.

Disclaimer:
I received a complimentary copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

Human trafficking, self-proclaimed King and Queen of New York, bad cops, tight-knit families and lovers growing closer than ever all in one book. One crazy ride of a book which takes you all over the city of NY and the seedy underbelly of immigrents who come into the United States looking for a chance to better their situation. Unfortunately for too many, they find themselves at the mercy of people who do not give one iota about them as an individual.

Kieran Finnegan is not such a person. She cares deeply, perhaps too deeply and when a woman is murdered after leaving her office, she becomes the next target. Finance and FBI agent, Craig Fraiser is all too willing to help her out, but it is just when the fun begins. Once you start, you will NOT want to put this book down! Declan, Danny and the rest of her brother's are there ready to put the beat down on whomever is threatening their little sister. Content to let Craig take the lead, the brother's run the family bar until Kieran needs them. When she does, Watch out! Great suspenseful read.

I always enjoy Heather Graham’s work, and A Dangerous Game is no exception. It’s the third installment in her “New York Confidential” series, but even though I haven’t read the first two books in this trilogy, I had no problem following the backstories of the existing characters. In fact, one of the things I really liked was that when Graham writes intimate scenes between protagonist Kieran Finnegan and her boyfriend Craig Fraiser, they really show the comfort of an established relationship without feeling boring or stale.

Graham is equally deft at writing intricate, fast-paced plots and vivid characters. The joy of reading something that’s part of a series is that the world you enter is rich and layered without the need for a ton of setup. The heart of the novel – the pub owned by Kieran and her brothers – was so well drawn that I found my mouth watering for shepherd’s pie, and I could hear the clanging of silverware and the driving beat of Irish rock music.

This isn’t ‘just’ a romance novel, however, it’s also a mystery, and that part of the book is never forgotten, nor is plot sacrificed for character moments that wouldn’t make sense.

Graham has given us another novel to devour – that’s really the way her books are best enjoyed – and, as always, I find that the experience was both entertaining and incredibly satisfying.

Goes well with Irish stew served with brown bread and a glass of hard cider.

2.5 stars A Dangerous Game is the third book in the "New York Confidential" series. In this one, Kieran is approached by a strange woman who hands her a baby and vanishes. Minutes later, Kiernan finds the woman dying of a stab wound. The case gets her and her FBI agent boyfriend, Craig, involved in an illegal human trafficking case.

This series seems to be a hot or miss for me. The first book, Flawless, was just OK. While, the second book, A Perfect Obsession, was really good and had me hooked from the start. I wanted to love this one too, however, this one just didn't hook me in and I found myself pushing to finish it. Other than the identity of the mother, I wasn't really interested in the mystery. It just kind of dragged.

I did love Craig and Kieran together. They make a great couple and it was fun to see their relationship get stronger. But, to be honest, Kieran was kind of annoying in the book and that was a first. I couldn't understand why she kept making dumb decisions. Craig was working the case, but she kept having to stick her nose in and put herself in danger. I think fans of the series will like this one. It wasn't bad, it just wasn't as exciting as I would have liked.

The newest installment to the series of adventurous and dangerous life Kieran Finnegan and Craig Frasier live is an intense investigation of the human trafficking amongst the vulnerable illegal immigrates.
The case itself is troubling and heartbreaking, bringing light to the many difficult aspects of immigration to the States. The social issues are well embedded into the tale, yet are educational and enlightening.
The many clues, some that seem insignificant, all are part of the bigger picture, and once again Kieran is in the middle of a deadly, dangerous, and even cruel crime spree, with culprits who have no respect to human life or rights. The culprits that seem to have connections everywhere, being able to stay just one step ahead of the investigation no matter where and how the task force is receiving information. The many twists in the plot and the hints of the outcome kept my interest high, and my eyes glued to the pages. To find the culprits was a run against the clock, and I got invested in the outcome, felt for the victims, and cheered for the good guys to find the criminals, to find the King and Queen, to find the connections they had to the law enforcement that fed them information.
I think this might have been my favorite book in the series when it comes to Kieran and Craig's relationship developing. The bond between them has always been tight, the attraction and the feelings they have for each other are a strong force in the stories. But in this story, their vulnerability is highlighted in several different situations, giving the tale another level of depth.
I usually do prefer the excitement of a new couple finding love in a middle of the drama and danger in my romantic suspense, but there are spark and energy in the stories written by Heather Graham that keep me coming back for more no matter in what form the story and series are written.
Vigorous and intense investigation of fatal and sinister crimes amongst the most vulnerable people that once again put Kieran and Craig in the middle of dire situations, making them evaluate their own lives and their future. From tedious combing of clues to aggressive action the story kept me on my toes until the volatile and violent conclusion.
~ Four Spoons with a teaspoon on the side

3 1/2 STARS!

Delectably enticing! From the first page, we are thrust into the middle of a complex crime and taken for a ride throughout New York, various crime scenes, various law enforcement agencies and multiple possible scenarios! The basis of the plot is good, but there are so many secondary characters brought into the mix that it dilutes the plot a lot. The main couple are intriguing, but spend the majority of the story chasing leads without showing their connection a great deal. Perhaps it was shown stronger earlier in the series, as this is the third book surrounding this family, but only the first that I'm reading. For me, it had promise, but was missing some substance. An okay read.

To say that she's a magnet for trouble might be putting it mildly as Kieran Finnegan finds herself once again thrust smack dab in the middle of a crime! She truly was just minding her own business wrapping up a normal day of business as a criminal psychologist when a woman approaches her by name and thrusts a baby into her arms. Attempting to catch up with her as she flees down the street, Keiran is shocked to see that she has been murdered practically in front of her!

With a heartfelt connection to this innocent baby, she sets out to try to find out what in the world is going on in this city and brings in her boyfriend, FBI Special Agent Craig Frasier to help her out. He agrees something is fishy and goes about investigating ... but attempting to keep Kieran safely on the sidelines doesn't work out that well.

A Dangerous Game is romantic suspense of the “established couples” variety of romantic suspense. FBI Special Agent Craig Frasier and therapist/pub owner Kieran Finnegan met and fell in love in the first book in the series, Flawless, while Craig was undercover. By the time this third book in the series takes place, after last year’s A Perfect Obsession, the two of them are very much in love and are at the stage of living together without actually deciding to live together. In other words, they spend their nights together, but still have two apartments.

They have been together more than long enough to know each other all too well, including each other’s bad habits and the tells they each exhibit when one or the other is covering something up. What they are covering up is usually a case, because Craig’s FBI work seems to run into either Kieran’s patients or her pub with well-beyond-coincidental frequency.

Kieran is a trouble magnet, and that is what begins this story.

A woman comes to Kieran’s office, calls her by name, and hands her a baby. Then the woman rushes out the door and is murdered within steps after she gets outside. It’s obvious that there is way more going on here than meets the eye, and there is plenty going on from that beginning.

The baby and the woman, both Jane Does, lead the police and the FBI to the seamy underground world of human trafficking and baby harvesting. And their investigation links to an all too similar five year old cold case.

Equally coincidentally, Kieran’s soon-to-be-sister-in-law, an Irish immigrant herself, is contacted by two young women, one of them also Irish, who are on the run from a human trafficking organization controlled by an unnamed but ruthless “King” and “Queen”.

As Craig, the FBI, the NYPD, Homeland Security AND the U.S. Marshalls’ office all investigate the various aspects of what seems to be an extremely well organized criminal enterprise that has eyes and ears virtually everywhere, Kieran strikes out on her own, putting herself in danger over and over again.

Not that Craig is ever exactly safe, but he is, at least trained for this. Kieran just can’t seem to resist putting herself in harm’s way, repeatedly and perhaps just a little too often.

In the end, they manage to cut off the head of this particular snake. And they decide to get married. All in a day’s work.

Escape Rating B: I have not read the previous books in this series, but I did read Law and Disorder, which seems to be part of a side-series to New York Confidential. It gave me enough background to be able to slide right into Kieran’s and Craig’s “adventures”, and into the terrific atmosphere of Finnegan’s Pub.
But I think a reader could come into A Dangerous Game without having read any of the previous books. Events from those earlier stories are certainly referred to, but don’t actually impact current events, except in the sense that they provide a pattern. It’s pretty clear that both Finnegan’s Pub and Kieran Finnegan herself attract trouble the way that certain lights attract bugs, as in they don’t exactly go looking for trouble, but they can’t resist it once they find it, and they willing dash themselves against it no matter how much damage it does to themselves or others.

The case that they have become involved in has a “ripped from the headlines” feel to it. In spite of our problems, the United States is still a country that many people in terrible situations want to come to. And the situations they are often fleeing are so terrible that they believe that any circumstance here, no matter how awful, must be better than the place they are so desperate to leave. The more the screws tighten on legal immigration, the more desperate people become, and the easier it is for the desperate to become prey to monsters in human form.

The human traffickers in this particular story have eyes and ears everywhere, and tentacles in every organization that can help them find more victims and cover up their crimes. Early on in the story, Craig is aware that someone close to the investigation, if not multiple someones, must be in the pay of the criminals. Figuring out who those person or persons might be takes place over a good chunk of the story. In the end, readers will find that the characters they have suspected all along are actually the guilty parties.

In spite of the frenetic beginning, the case as a whole takes a while to ramp up to speed. I found the first third of the book a bit slow going, but once past that point, events occur at breakneck speed and the reader gets caught up in the chase. In spite of the predictable elements to some parts of the ending, the story does keep you glued to your seat from that point forward. In the end, a good time is had by all, including the reader, and evil does get its just desserts. As it should be.

I have to admit to you I wasn't sure why I choose this book to review. I'm saying this not because I thought it wouldn't be a good story, I happened to love Heather Graham so that's not the issue. It was because I hadn't read the first two books in the series and usually don't read out of order.

This time I did. Since I'm a little behind on her I really didn't know at first it was out of order. In fact when the tour came up I didn't even read what the book was about. I knew I enjoyed her books so I jumped right in.

Silly me!

The good thing about this is that even though the characters are the same for each book the plot is different. This isn't a continual story, it just has the same characters for each new book.

This made it much easier on me to read. I really liked both Kieran and Craig. You can really feel the affection between these two and they work so well together solving this mystery. I really felt this was more of a mystery then a romantic suspense. I didn't think it was heavy on the romance. Of course that could be because their romance began in the first book so by now it's old hat to them.

The fact that it wasn't heavy on romance didn't stop me from enjoying the story. It's well written and the charcters are very enjoyable. You'll find that you can get lost in the mystery of what's going on and want to know where it's going. This is a wonderful book that can be read by either straight fiction readers or those of enjoy romantic suspense.

My Rating:

3.5

Favorite Quotes:

Babies tended to be adorable— and this baby was especially so. In fact, Kieran wasn’t sure she’d ever seen an ugly baby, but she had been assured by friends that they did exist.

“Don’t dillydally,” Sister Teresa said, and for a moment, she felt as if she was dealing with Mary Poppins— had Mary Poppins decided to join a convent.

Kieran truly worked for the nicest people in the world. They were, in fact, so nice, that she almost felt she worked with magnanimous puppets that might have been created at a Jim Henson fabrication facility.

We check out tons of nothing. That’s the only way you ever get to something…

My Review:

I can’t quite put my finger on it… it wasn’t bad, but it just wasn’t… as engaging as I desired. The story was complicated yet intriguing, and the mystery was not one I could have solved, as there were far too many characters to keep track of and remember; at least too many for my poor pea brain, I fear it was singed by the effort. The main character of Kieran was well-meaning but a danger magnet who tended to pull others into her troublesome vortex. I enjoyed the welcome hits of humor and banter but they were too few and far between. My favorite character was the old lady who was a biter, she bit the cable man… I know, I’m a rebel… what can I say? I’ve wanted to bite a cable man or three…

New York City: “If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.” Give that old chestnut a tug—there’s not a crime imaginable that hasn’t played out in the Big Apple. It’s an ideal setting for the third book in Heather Graham’s New York Confidential romantic-suspense series.

Working late at her office, Psychologist Kieran Finnegan is confronted by a distraught woman who thrusts an infant into her arms. Kieran tears after her, shoving through the crowds on the sidewalk.

“Listen, I’ll help you, I’ll help the baby! It’s all right…”

It wasn’t in any way all right. The woman lurched forward, as if she would fall into Kieran’s arms, if Kieran had just been close enough.

She wasn’t.

The woman fell face-first down onto the sidewalk.

That’s when Kieran saw the knife protruding from the woman’s back and the rivulets of blood suddenly forming all around her and joining together to create a crimson pool.

Psychologists are trained not to take their work home, but even after Baby Doe is safely in the hands of child protective services, Kieran can’t stop thinking about the infant with a “headful of auburn ringlets and huge blue eyes.” She enlists the help of her boyfriend, FBI Special Agent Craig Frasier. Craig puts together an alphabet soup of investigators, pulling in New York City detectives, a Major Crimes investigation, U.S. Marshals, Homeland Security, and undercover FBI operatives. Turf battles fade beside the horror of what they determine—the victim was murdered to ensure she didn’t rat out an illegal adoption operation.

Worried and looking to distract herself—even though she knows Craig is all in for solving the mystery—Kieran heads over to Finnegan’s, her family’s Irish pub. She and three brothers—Declan, Danny, and Kevin—are co-owners.

Heather Graham does a great job of showing how Kieran and Craig operate on parallel tracks to solve the crime. While Craig feverishly follows leads, Declan’s fiancée—Irish immigrant Mary Kathleen—asks Kieran to accompany her to the soup kitchen at St. Peter’s. The pub is fully staffed, and everyone knows that Kieran can be like a dog with a bone when she’s on the scent of a crime, so better to keep her busy dishing out soup. Mary Kathleen warns Kieran not to prejudge the clients—although some sleep rough, most of them just work hard to make ends meet. She might meet some whiners or malcontents, but that’s alright.

Mary Kathleen laughed. “There’s absolutely nothing wrong with my beautiful adopted homeland. But here’s the thing—people come here because we can whine. Complaining is the God-given right of every American! You just have to remember that throughout history, people have come here for a dream.

Kieran plunges in, serving countless bowls of soup and “learning a smattering of words—mainly please and thank you—in French, Creole, Spanish, and what she was pretty sure was Russian.” She’s unnerved when she notices a group of young women observing her—and a man too, who smiles at her but not with “an entirely nice smile.”

Should she trust her gut that something was not quite right? Or did she just need to get over herself?

Her gut didn’t let her down. Back at Finnegan’s, she has a surprising visitor: “a tall, dark figure with a sweeping cloak around it.” It’s Sister Teresa from the soup kitchen, who asks Kieran to return the next day to speak with a young lady who asked the nun if she knew Kieran.

“And—since Mary Kathleen did fill me in on quite a bit—I believe this young woman might be looking to you for assistance, and help in what may be a criminal matter having to do with a beautiful baby girl.”

There’s no “may” about it. Craig’s team and Kieran’s family meet after hours at Finnegan’s so Richard Egan, Craig’s boss, can fill everyone in: “Someone is dealing in human trafficking.” It starts with someone wanting a better life, Egan says, channeling the words of poet Emma Lazarus, “Give me your tired, your poor, / Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” Unfortunately, Egan reminds the group, “once you’ve arrived—illegally—you’re at their mercy.”

“Then they use you for slave labor, prostitution, or both, I’m assuming. They’re probably using people in drug deals and gambling operations, as well.”

It’s a vicious criminal conspiracy of long standing. The illegal immigrants abused by “scam artists” are terrified of being discovered and sent back to their home countries. Craig and Kieran are targeted more than once by unseen assailants. They’re an appealing couple, fighting through a fog of misdirection, each operating solo at times to protect the other. The tension is unrelenting, focused on New Yorkers who literally and metaphorically run into burning buildings to save lives. At its core, however, A Dangerous Game is a paean of praise to the notion of America, a nation of immigrants, and the risks folks take for freedom.

A DANGEROUS GAME takes us back into the New York Finnegan's world. It is action packed, frightening and with a number of twists that only author Heather Graham can come up with. This is a storyline right out of the newspapers of today where evil takes advantage of the innocent for profit. I love the Finnegan family as they are there for each other in everything they do, they might not agree with what the other is doing, but they will back them. I also have felt a little sorry for Craig, because Kieran is one of those who sees trouble and instead of running, she is ready to face the mystery and find the truth. Their romance does manage to keep going and get stronger ... even a little talk of living together and marriage comes out between the danger and bad things happening.

I have always enjoyed Ms. Graham's way of sending her readers on little rides one way only to give a sudden turn, and we find something completely different in front of us. She keeps us guessing, and in this one, I was completely thrown by who the bad guys were. But I did get a chuckle when I read how the culprit was apprehended and you will have to read A DANGEROUS GAME to find out the answer to that one.

If you want danger, mystery, family, a sweet yet steamy romance then get your hands on A DANGEROUS GAME and enjoy the ride.

~~ Annetta Sweetko, reviewer for Fresh Fiction

Complete review may be found at: http://freshfiction.com/review.php?id=64744

consistently interesting and a great writer. I really enjoy this new series by Heather Graham. Plot twists, interesting characters overall an engaging read.

I just loved reading this book! It had another different mystery-though there was a death very quickly-but someone handing Kieran a baby and then getting killed? Yeah, that's something new, and I was really excited to read it!

This is the 3rd book with Kieran and Craig, and by now, they're pretty settled into their relationship. Not to say they don't have their problems, all couples do, but it would take something really big to tear them apart. And I'm glad, because they deserve to be happy!

Human trafficking-especially in babies, is pretty horrendous. And add into the fact that lead that she got though the family pub, makes things all the more personal for Kieran. And while it's not really her case, she is invested!

Loved how things were solved, as always, there were some pretty heart-pounding moments there! I don't know why bad guys do what they do, especially when they're basically caught. It just boggles the mind!

This book was really fantastic, and whether there's more books in this series or not, I'm happy!

Known as a do-gooder who saves others - lands Kieran into a mystery. A baby is thrust into her hands right before the woman who leaves the baby is killed right in front of her. This latest book in Kieran and Craig's suspense exposes the underbelly of human trafficking and black market babies.

Kieran seems to be the new Mrs. Jessica Fletcher from a much beloved TV series, "Murder She Wrote". Whilst Kieran's job lends her to work with law enforcement, specifically the FBI, being an amateur sleuth who finds herself in trouble quite frequently is starting to wear thin. I like Kieran. For the most part, she is good with figuring out the mystery. My only question is why must she make such poor decisions which gets either her or Craig kidnapped or shot? She is trouble waiting to happen. Is it because she's Irish and has a fiery temper to match her colouring? Does this lead to her impatience to go alone when she is better served with back up? Perhaps. And as always, Craig's gut feeling that something has gone wrong with Kieran is correct. Usually it is a tad too late to prevent her from making a mistake.

What I do find interesting is the way Ms. Graham writes the characters so that I can hear them speak with their accents in my head. There were quite a few people of different ethnicity in this story and they were all portrayed in a distinct manner. Their interactions came across realistic and brings to light an ignored horror in America. Whilst this is a fictional story, there is a

This is book 3 in the New York Confidential series and is an excellent read! I was fascinated by Kieran Finnegan, a forensic psychologist who not only delves into her client's psyches, but has a knack for detective work. Craig Frasier, her FBI agent-boyfriend, wants to take the lead when a woman hands Kieran an infant, flees and is murdered. It's impossible to Kieran not to get involved and take Craig's advice. Fast-moving plot with engaging characters. Highly recommend

One of my favorite installments in this book. A dark subject, human trafficking is uncovered and illuminated as the heinous crime many ignore. The family and the pub have the same uniting impact as in the previous books. A goos suspense filled read for any FBI, Irish, actions filled novel fan.

Heather Graham is one of my top selling authors. I always have pre-orders for her new releases. This was not my favoritee book by her but I do like the series. This one just seem to drag some in the middle