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Review_FICTION

novel (after 2016’s Time After Time).
Twenty years earlier, Abby and Liam were ★ High White Sun
in love and planned to move in together,
J. Todd Scott. Putnam, $26 (480p) ISBN 978-0-399-17635-7
but when a night of drinking resulted in
an accident that injured Abby and killed cott’s superb sequel to 2016’s The Far Empty com-
her younger brother, she ended the rela- bines multifaceted characters with edge-of-the-seat
tionship. Unexpectedly reunited in suspense. The savage bludgeoning of river guide
Bromley, the two confront their attraction S Billy Bravo, which obliterated part of his face,
to each other as Abby desperately tries to
leads Texas sheriff Chris Cherry’s deputies—veteran Ben
keep her teenage daughter, Sarah, away
Harper and rookie Amé Reynosa—to confront John
from Liam’s alluring son, Zac. The possi-
Wesley Earl, a leader of a vicious prison gang, the Aryan
bility that Liam, not Nate, might be
Brotherhood of Texas. Their efforts to find proof linking
Sarah’s father raises the stakes.
the ABT to the murder are derailed by a surprising revelation from an FBI agent,
Meanwhile, Liam’s wife, Nancy, pursues
making Chris’s pursuit of justice even harder. The reverberations of the brutal
her own agenda. Ultimately, though, the
1999 murder of Texas Ranger Bob Ford also affect the homicide investigation.
plot falters, and a deus ex machina resolu-
Scott excels at presenting the juxtaposition of the horrific and the mundane (“Her
tion and late revelation about the long-
daddy had died on a stretch of dirty concrete ten steps from her window, and
ago accident feel contrived. This sopho-
afterward cops came and got the body and took some pictures and tossed their
more effort works better as an exploration
cigarette butts on the place where he’d drawn his last breath, leaving behind only
of personal relationships than a thriller.
a yellow chalk outline”). Ace Atkins fans will relish this gritty crime novel.
Agents: Cassandra Rodgers and Sam Hiyate,
Author tour. Agent: Carlie Webber, CK Webber Associates. (Mar.)
Rights Factory (Canada). (Mar.)
The Stakes
Ben Sanders. Minotaur, $25.99 (336p) Playing with Bonbon Fire: Kirkland disappears with her school-age
ISBN 978-1-250-14011-1 A Southern Chocolate Shop Mystery twins. Her soon-to-be ex-husband, Dr. Paul
The NYPD is investigating detective Dorothy St. James. Crooked Lane, $26.99 Kirkland, an ob-gyn in Yellow Springs,
Miles Keller, the hero of this entertaining (352p) ISBN 978-1-68331-468-4 Ohio, reports them missing. Kristin
if sketchy crime novel from New Zealand St. James’s so-so sequel to 2017’s Asking inherited a $1 million life insurance set-
author Sanders (Marshall’s Law), for for Truffle finds Charity Penn running the tlement when her first husband was killed
killing Jack Deen, a hit man he believed Chocolate Box in Camellia Beach, S.C., a in a tragic boating accident while she was
was targeting his ex-girlfriend, former store she inherited from her late maternal pregnant with the twins. Has she vanished
police informant Lucy Gates. On the side, grandmother, Mabel Maybank, and trying thinking that her money might be depleted
Miles robs wealthy criminals. His current to learn more about her wealthy Maybank in a divorce settlement, or is something
extracurricular project is intercepting a relatives. She’s also involved in putting more nefarious taking place? A search of
payoff to a rich and ruthless lawyer playing together the inaugural Summer Solstice Kristin’s computer reveals recent visits
go-between in an assassination plot. Beach Music Festival. Headlining the fest to websites advising victims of spousal
Meanwhile, a rich gangster sends L.A. is the reunion of local band the Embers, but abuse. Paul, already under some suspicion,
hired gun Bobby Deen, Jack’s cousin, to the star attraction is music great Bixby comes under intense police scrutiny. As
New York to locate his missing wife, the Lewis. When a burned body is discovered the investigation proceeds, women who
irresistible and brilliant Nina. Nina just by a beach bonfire, Penn fears it’s Bixby, socialized with Kristin begin to examine
happens to be in the heist business, too, but the victim turns out to be Stan Frasier, their own lives. Short passages threaded
and tempts both Miles and Bobby with her the disaffected former lead singer for the throughout the narrative, presumably
latest scheme. Fast-paced alternating view- Embers who had a hit with another group written by Kristin, reveal the pain in her
points—Miles’s and Bobby’s—challenge in the 1970s. Penn seizes the chance to play marriage and her need to escape before
the reader to keep track of the complicated amateur sleuth, but she must contend with she is murdered. The mysteries of whether
plot. Convincing dialogue and unex- police chief Hank Byrd, who warns her not Paul is culpable, and, if so, how and whether
pected twists help compensate for a surfeit to investigate or interfere. Too much is he will be discovered, make for a taut tale.
of heists and insufficiently filled-out char- going on in this farrago of a mystery, but Agent: Barbara Poelle, Irene Goodman Literary.
acters (where Miles lives is never clear). cozy fans will still have fun. Agent: Jill (Mar.)
References to New York’s “freeways” and Marsal, Marsal Lyon Literary Agency. (Mar.)
subway “carriages” suggest Sanders could Illegal Holdings:
have used more editorial direction. Still, Not That I Could Tell A Valentin Vermeulen Thriller
fans of Donald Westlake’s caper novels Jessica Strawser. St. Martin’s, $26.99 (320p) Michael Niemann. Coffeetown, $14.95 trade
will find much to like. Agent: Dan Myers, ISBN 978-1-250-10788-6 paper (240p) ISBN 978-1-60381-591-8
Word/Link Literary Agency. (Mar.) Early in this engrossing domestic thriller Niemann’s well-plotted third Valentin
from Strawser (Almost Missed You), Kristin Vermeulen thriller (after 2017’s Illicit

64 PUBLISHERS WEEKLY ■ JANU AR Y 22, 2018