Two Is a Pattern

De: Emily Waters

Narrado por: Anastasia Watley

A charged lesbian romantic suspense set in the early nineties, with gripping twists, turns, and surprising secrets.

A mission gone wrong leads to rising-star CIA operative Annie Weaver quitting her job and reinventing herself as a college student. But the CIA, desperate for her skills, refuses to let her go without a price.

Annie finds herself juggling classes in criminology and falling for her beautiful landlord, Professor Helen Everton, while dealing with off-the-books secret missions for an increasingly controlling ex-boss.

As the perceptive Helen circles ever closer to the truth, Annie has to figure out how to keep her freedom without putting Helen in danger—and without revealing her own past.

Contains mature themes.

©2024 Emily Waters (P)2024 Tantor Media

Not your typical romance

This was written with much more complexity than the usual “romance”. There is actually a well developed story line - interesting in itself - which accompanies and supports the romance. It was refreshing to find a story in this genre that did not resonate completely with something that you’ve already heard before a thousand times. I highly recommend this book. The author did an exceptional job as did the narrator.

Great story

I loved everything about this book. The characters were interesting and the story was intriguing

Needs to be twenty minutes longer!

This book was actually far better than I thought it would be, and kept me engaged throughout. It captured both the sexism and the institutional homophobia of the time, and though I have no idea whether its portrayal of covert intelligence work in the last days of the Cold War is accurate, it certainly seemed believable. It's always interesting to be reminded of how different life was before mobile phones-we really did have to spend a lot of time just finding a phone! The MCs were both likeable and interesting.

However, unlike most books, where the book is better than the movie, this story would probably work far better on film, where the cinematography could resolve some of the ambiguities-especially with the ending, but also some of the scene changes. Perhaps the narrator could have paused for longer between scenes, but it sometimes took a bit for me to register that the action had shifted.

There are certainly times when an ambiguous ending "works" (especially in short stories or when you're trying to make a point about how complicated real life can be) but I think I'm probably speaking for most romance fans when I say that after investing a substantial period of time into the lives of the characters, we like everything "tied up in a bow", not just being assured that there was a "happily ever after", but how many puppies their dogs had. UPDATE; There is apparently a sequel to this novel in the works-and it it resolves my questions I would raise my story rating from four to five stars.

Lovely story

One of the best sapphic books I’ve had the pleasure of listening to. Kept me on my toes throughout literally to the last second. I hope part two is in the works I would love a continuation of Annie and Helen’s story

love the narrator

Interesting premise for the story but it was confusing at some time. It is Worth trying if you like the double life kind of story

left me a bit flummoxed

Reading the blurp had me thinking the story would revolve around how the two MCs would navigate (and conquer) the challenges to their growing relationship. It didn't. And thought I guess you could call it a HEA, I was still left with a sense of sadness and sorrow for what they didn't get to have. That said, I think it was a very well written story with depth and compassion. And narrator does an excellent job as usual.

Heart melting

The character depth draws you in and the story of these two is heart melting and pure.

Fantastic!

This story was slow to the start, but I’m very glad I stuck around. I fell in love with the Evertons and Annie with Helen. That storyline and friendship was so cute and sad and sweet. The pacing at times irked me a bit, it kind of broke off abruptly in scenes but overall everything about this book was solid. Oh and as always, Anastasia Watley did an amazing narration job!

This was an excellent book

This was a very surprising book. I felt that the end was rushed but it was otherwise well written, I liked the MC and narration was wow.

Fantastic

Stars: 5 Stars
Format: Audiobook
Narrator: Anastasia Watley
Series: Stand Alone
Steam Level: Steamy

I read this for the 2025 Sapphic Book Bingo reading challenge for the prompt Suspenseful Book.

CW: death (past), death of a child (past), violence

I adore Emily Waters and want a billion more books written by her.

Quick Thoughts:
- This started as an AU for a The Closer/Major Crimes fanfic and is crafted so well that you don’t need to know anything about the shows but those of us who are fans catch the Easter Eggs
- Single mother and age gap in this book. I’m noticing a trend in what I read
- Like in her other book, this is only told through one POV which is Annie’s
- It took me a minute to realize it’s set in 1992. Talk about giving me all kinds of flashbacks
- It was fun watching Annie slip so easily into Helen’s family life
- More I learned about Annie’s past, the more I wanted to cover her in bubble wrap and guard her with a baseball bat
- The title doesn’t make sense until the last third of the book and I thought it was pretty darn clever
- Hey Mallory! (from Honey in the Marrow)
- Frank Clifton should have been boiled in a vat of acid
- That ending from when she’s planting the bug to the last page, wow. Just wow. Perfect (though I’m hoping for either a short story or book that continues this book)
- Anastasia Watley is amazing. She does a fantastic job at infusing her voice with amusement, concern, confusion, and all sorts of emotions, on top of that, she simply has a soothing voice

Overall I adored this book. Emily Waters did a superb job in drenching the setting in the early 90s and told a fantastic story to boot. On one hand I’m so very happy I read this, on the other hand I’m sad I did because now I have to wait for the next Emily Waters book. Dang.