The tagline for the Code Red series describes it as “Ordinary People. Extraordinary Circumstances.” Blown Away, like the rest of the books so far, has more in common with the people than the circumstances. This is a very ordinary, not to mention fairly boring, read.

As the book opens, part-time hang gliding instructor Kara Abbott is snagged in a tree, trapped above the ground. K-9 Officer Cole Winslow and his canine partner Mel come to her rescue. She impulsively rewards him with a kiss. They both feel the attraction between them, but neither is looking for a relationship.

Kara is a single mother to an eight-year-old son. When her good-for-nothing husband was convicted of operating yet another get-rich-quick scam in San Francisco, Kara divorced him and moved to the Southern California town of Courage Bay. Wanting to spare her son’s feelings, she told him that his father joined the army and was sent overseas to Germany. I’ll give you one guess whether she finally tells him the truth in a calm scene, or whether she insists on keeping the secret forever until he finally finds out on his own, leading to tears and melodrama.

Cole was previously married. His wife had planned to leave him, until she died in a car accident before she could go through with it. There’s more to this that Cole feels guilty about, none of which will surprise most readers. In spite of their mutual issues, Cole and Kara start spending more and more time together. And everything happens pretty much the way you’d expect it to.

This is basically a textbook example of an average series romance. It’s a decent enough read. There’s nothing wrong with it, but also nothing all that right with it either. It’s a pleasant Christmas romance about a single mom and a cop falling in love. The characters are sympathetic, but neither deep nor compelling. There’s no big drama, no real tension, no action. It’s an entirely character-driven story about two people who spend a lot of time together and in the end decide they’re in love.

Readers who enjoy quiet love stories may not find it as boring as I did, but for me this one was a little too quiet – the kind of book where I tried to remember what I’d just read on the last 240 pages and couldn’t come up with anything. They do some Christmas shopping. Cole tries to put reindeer decorations on Kara’s house when she’s not home; wacky hijinks ensue. Kara agrees to go on a date with her boss, whose behavior uncomfortably verges on sexual harassment. Kara and Cole have several squabbles about their issues, which inevitably seems to lead to kissing.

It goes by easily enough, but there’s nothing distinctive or special about this story to make it stand out. It all seems so familiar. After the death of his wife, Cole became a confirmed bachelor, engaging in simple relationships with women that he never allowed to become deeper. At one point, Kara and Cole run into a former girlfriend of Cole’s, who is clearly jealous at the closeness she sees between them after he refused to go to the next level with her. This seemed like something I’d read before. It took me a while to remember I’d not only read a similar scene before, I’d read it earlier in this same series. The hero two books ago was also a confirmed bachelor who left some disappointed former flings in his wake after hooking up with the heroine. Five books in, and the series is already repeating itself.

So far this series hasn’t really delivered the excitement it promised. I really hope it picks up soon. I wasn’t blown away by this book. I doubt many readers will be.