Star Cruise: Outbreak

I enjoyed the first book in this series, The Wreck of the Nebula Dream. The author, Veronica Scott, did a great job mixing action, adventure, science fiction and romance and I wanted to see if she was able to replicate that magical formula. Star Cruise was slightly different than the first novel, dealing with real life subjects like PTSD and alcoholism, but still had that great mix of genres I mentioned above. The cruise ship is crewed by a group of ex military vets. Our protagonist, Dr. Emily Shane, famously saved lives on an under siege beach on the planet of Fantalar. She earned the nickname the Angel of Fantalar because she refused to leave the beach during the retreat and ended up taking care of wounded soldiers while hiding from the enemy until they were rescued three months later. As with real life vets, she suffers from PTSD. Her father volunteers her services on this cruise ship as a last minute replacement for a doctor that has gone AWOL, just to get her off the couch. Jake Dilon was one of the vets she saved on the beach at Fantalar, and her love interest in this story. He is the head of security for the ship and assigned as her liaison. He immediately notices her PTSD. That bender she went on kind of clued him in, however, he very subtly helps her overcome her fears of big crowds and loud places. By his description (tall, blonde and handsome) it wasn’t that big a hardship. Not until a virus breaks out on the ship and starts killing off people. I did find the romance a little affected, but Emily’s reactions as a vet trying to overcome PTSD and Jake’s support of that issue balanced the cheese factor. When the virus breaks out the doctor overcomes her fears pretty quickly. I enjoyed the mystery surrounding the virus, and the way everyone worked together to minimize it. An interesting side note is that the first novel reminded me of the movie the Poseidon Adventure and this book reminded me a bit of Outbreak by Robin Cook. I’d have to read another in the series to see if this is a consistent trend with this author. Her books are very original, don’t get me wrong, but that similarity is interesting! I think I will be picking up the next book because these serial novels are pretty addicting. I hope it’s catching! Lol.

Enjoyable. I love sfr, with the r being subordinate to the sf and Ms. Scott does it well. I liked her other books better, though. That's why only three stars, not four.