“Fear keeps you alert. It keeps you alive. If you’re afraid, you’re still fighting to stay alive. When you stop feeling fear, you’ve stopped caring whether you live or die.”
❤ ABOUT THE BOOK ❤
Ex-Navy SEAL Stone Pressfield had a bad feeling about the proposed missions trip to Manila, Philippines. The college-age church group plans to go to Manila and help victims of the sex-trafficking industry. Stone’s lingering nightmare memories about the sex-trafficking industry has him warning church leaders that the trip is a bad idea. He knows all too well that it could end in violence, and those involved aren’t to be trifled with.
When beautiful Wren Morgan goes missing, he has a sick feeling that he knows exactly who took her, and for what purpose. The problem is, Wren isn’t just any other student. She’s someone he was close to, someone he cares about. Now she’s in the hands of cruel, evil men, and Stone is the only one who can rescue her before the unthinkable happens.
Both haunting and captivating from the first page, The Missionary takes readers on an action-packed, romantic and eye-opening journey that will hopefully serve to raise awareness about human trafficking.
I was drawn into the story from the first few pages and found myself unable to look away. The manner in which Wren was taken felt all too real and the subject matter is raw, chilling and hard to read in places. I think the fact that many elements of this story were based on reality gave each scene an extra strong impact.
However, the story is not ‘too dark’. It’s a nightmarish situation but there was also a strong romance throughout it and plenty of steam to ease the tension. If you’ve read Jasinda Wilder’s Wounded, that book is a good comparison in terms of how this book “felt” to me. There were certainly gritty elements but overall, it was not solely a ‘dark’ book.
The ending was powerful and inspiring and I won’t deny that I had tears in my eyes at the last words of the author’s note. I commend Jack Wilder for tackling a sensitive but very real issue and bringing it into the light in such a way that will hopefully motivate people to get involved and reach out to help.
I felt these words so strongly:
“Be the difference.”
4 stars
** Please note that the reason this review is a little shorter and less detailed than my usual ones is because due to a computer glitch, I actually lost the entirety of my original review a few days ago and had to start over from scratch 🙁 So, the length of the review is not in any way a reflection of the book, but rather just of the unfortunate circumstance.
