Deal with the Devil

December 1, 2019

In postapocalyptic Atlanta, many are scrounging for their lives. This includes Nina, who not only leads a small team that finds artifacts to make money, but discovers lost information and digitized works to help her community. When Captain Garrett Knox offers her a lead on a bunker containing backup of the Library of Congress servers, it seems too good to be true. Especially since Knox is the leader of the Silver Devils, an elite squad of super soldiers who cut loose from the Protectorate. Yet the temptation is too great to resist, so Nina, Knox, and their teams join to hunt the bunker through treacherous outlaw territory. The treachery is not just outside, however. The Silver Devils are trying to recover their kidnapped biochem hacker--and the ransom is Nina. VERDICT Rocha (coauthor, Ivan) slide into traditional publishing with a high-action, high-stakes sf romance. Intriguing characters, tragic backgrounds, and a few twists comprise a strong launch to this new series.--Kristi Chadwick, Massachusetts Lib. Syst., Northampton

Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 10, 2020
Rocha, the pseudonym for writing duo Donna Herren and Bree Bridges (the Beyond series), matches the relentless action of this postapocalyptic thriller (and Mercenary Librarian series launch) with simmering sexual tension. It’s the latter half of the 21st century, solar flares and energy wars have all but destroyed human civilization, and Nina and her team of librarians work as “information brokers” with deadly combat skills. When Capt. Garrett Knox, leader of the Silver Devils, a gang of rogue soldiers who’ve broken off from their former employers, TechCorps, to avoid the slaughter of innocents, approaches Nina with a job for the librarians, they team up to recover the Library of Congress archives from seven underground bunkers scattered across the U.S. As they race to unearth the archives before TechCorps finds them, sparks fly between Nina and Knox, but hidden agendas and looming danger stand in the way of their happiness. Rocha capably deploys found family and forbidden love tropes while keeping readers on their toes with unpredictable action beats. This postapocalyptic tale of espionage and romance will have readers eager to know what happens next. Agent: Sarah Younger, Nancy Yost Literary.

Starred review from April 1, 2020
Captain Garrett Knox leads the notorious Silver Devils, biometrically enhanced supersoldiers gone rogue from TechCorp, the company that rules the near-future United States with a capitalist iron fist. When one of his team is kidnapped, he will stop at nothing to get her back, which means tricking information broker Nina into a mission to locate the legendary Rogue Library of Congress. But Nina has a team, too, and soon she and her two mercenary librarian pals?also escapees from the genetic labs that made them?are on a road trip with the Silver Devils. There are dangers along the way, like landmines and gangs and a roadhouse fight club, but the biggest danger is Nina. She is a tactical genius, a brutal fighter, and both a leader and a sister to Dani and Maya, but worse, she offers Knox dubious hope that the future can be better. The danger ratchets up alongside their attraction, and paranormal romance writing duo Rocha throws twist after twist at the teams while building their camaraderie, which would be cruel if it wasn't so fun to read. Compelling characters, white-knuckle action, and deceptively smooth worldbuilding make this first Mercenary Librarians book a satisfying and cinematic escape.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)