So yes, as listed under Currently Reading on my webpage, I am still reading Subversives!  I am now more than 65% of the way through the book, Reagan  just became governor of California, so the battles rages more fiercely! But while reading that, I am still reading mysteries, and just finished Book 14 for 2014, Kings of Midnight from Wallace Stroby.

Kings of Midnight is the second book in the Crissa Stone series, and  in it , Crissa, the criminal you root for, is battling to recover,  some of the millions, that now dead mob boss Joey Dios hid from a robbery thirty-five years ago!! Crissa needs the money after the profits of her latest heist, were lessened by a crook that was trying to launder the money for her.  Crissa needs to get back some of that money and maybe make one big score to help her boyfriend get out of prison, and to get her daughter back. So Crissa, is all ears when Jimmy Peaches sets  her  up with Benny Roth, a lower level member of Joey’s crew, who just may know where Joey hid the money. Only problem is that other mobsters are on the trail of the money too!

The book’s plot seemed rather simplistic, but Stroby’s writing style, and the characters he creates keep the action moving, and the pages turning right up until the last page of the book. Crissa is a character, that while a criminal, you still can root for her to come out on top, and this time , well actually like the last, she’s up against some pretty tough mobsters! So it was a quick fun read, and I’m looking forward to moving onto the next caper!!

Here’s what others say about Stroby’s books….

“Just when you think that you can’t be surprised anymore, a writer like Wallace Stroby ups the ante” – Laura Lippman

“Another fast, taut, winner from Stroby. As for Crissa, she may be crime fiction’s best bad girl ever” – Kirkus Reviews (starred review) on Cold Shot to the Heart.

So check out the Crissa Stone series!

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Oh Boy! I finally read a book quickly and increased this years book’s read total all the way to eight!! (He says with a sarcastic sneer on his face and tone in his voice). The book was Cold Shot to the Heart  and is book #1 in the Crissa Stone series from Long Branch, New Jersey native Wallace Stroby. They always say that you should write about what you know and what would a former writer for the Newark Star-Ledger know better mob related crime! (typed with Jon Stewart’s mob voice ringing in my ears!)

See Crissa is not a PI or a cop rather she is a career criminal. When the reader meets Crissa, she and her crew are robbing a store whose sign reads – CHECK CASHING MONEY TRANSFERS PAY DAY LOANS, a fine upstanding facility doubt!  The job went well but the take was not what her team expected. When she comes home to New York City, she learns that her lover and partner Wayne, who is three years into a seven-year sentence is coming up for parole He may gain his parole, if Crissa can get 250 grand in the hands of Texan, who may be able to grease the wheels enough, to make it happen.

So when Crissa is asked to join a three-man crew to boost an illegal poker game in Miami, that may have a million dollars on the table, it seems like a no-brainer. And up until Crissa money in hand, hears gunshots coming from the room that she just left  it was and then, all hell breaks loose in the form of Eddie the Saint, a hit-man recently released from prison, who is soon on the trail of the money. Bodies start to pile up and Crissa is in for the fight of her life!!

This was a quick read, with some well-developed characters, i.e. Crissa, and plenty of action to keep the pages turning. When I finished the book I was ready for book two Kings of Midnight. So check it out!

Links

Wallace Stroby at: Goodreads
Amazon

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