Things You Save in a Fire
Katherine Center
320 pages
Published 2019
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This is a heartwarming contemporary novel set in Massachusetts, about a tough female firefighter who reconnects with her estranged mother and finds love despite her best efforts not to. I wanted to read this when I first heard of it back in 2019, but was declined an ARC then and wasn’t keen enough to buy it, so was chuffed when it came up as one of the options at my new Book Club. It’s a lighter read than I was expecting – and more of a romance – but I enjoyed it for the feisty brave main character and sweet if predictable plot.
Cassie Hanwell has worked hard to cement her place as just one of the guys on the team as a paramedic firefighter in Austen Texas, avoiding love and attachments at all costs. Then her mother, who is losing her sight, pleads with her to move to Boston to help her out following a health problem, and an incident with an enemy from her past forces her out of the job she loves and excels at. Out of options, Cassie joins an old-school team of firefighters in Lillian, where only the handsome rookie seems happy to have her around. Then a series of disturbing events show that someone is trying to get her to quit: can Cassie forgive her mother, unmask her stalker and open her heart to love before it’s too late?
I really liked the mixture of humour and serious topics here, and the love story part of it was bearable mainly because the rookie was so adorable, and Cassie so not a typical romance heroine. The details about firefighting were interesting (the author’s husband is a volunteer firefighter) and the difficulties Cassie experiences being a woman in a man’s world felt realistic. I’m definitely keen to read more from this author.
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