From Publishers Weekly
What crime fiction fan can resist a guy who isn't afraid to knock a few slime-bag heads when no one is watching? In Swain's fine second suspense novel to feature South Florida PI Jack Carpenter (after Midnight Rambler), imprisoned serial killer Abb Grimes hires the tough, unrelenting ex-cop to find his kidnapped grandson, Sampson Grimes. The chief suspect is the child's father, Jed Grimes, but Jack thinks Jed is innocent, even though the evidence suggests otherwise. There's plenty of action and intelligent sleuthing, but it's Jack's uncompromising character and Swain's equally uncompromising writing that will keep readers turning pages and eager for the next installment: I'd visited many prisons, and the smell was always the same: a choking mixture of piss, shit, fear, and desperation, wiped down by harsh antiseptics. The winner of France's Prix Calibre 38, Swain is also the author of Deadman's Bluff and six other books in his Tony Valentine gambling series. (Oct.)
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Review
"What crime fiction fan can resist a guy who isn't afraid to knock a few slime-bag heads when no one is watching? In Swain's fine second suspense novel to feature South Florida PI Jack Carpenter (after Midnight Rambler), imprisoned serial killer Abb Grimes hires the tough, unrelenting ex-cop to find his kidnapped grandson, Sampson Grimes. The chief suspect is the child's father, Jed Grimes, but Jack thinks Jed is innocent, even though the evidence suggests otherwise. There's plenty of action and intelligent sleuthing, but it's Jack's uncompromising character and Swain's equally uncompromising writing that will keep readers turning pages and eager for the next installment: โI'd visited many prisons, and the smell was always the same: a choking mixture of piss, shit, fear, and desperation, wiped down by harsh antiseptics.โ The winner of France's Prix Calibre 38, Swain is also the author of Deadman's Bluff and six other books in his Tony Valentine gambling series." _ - Publishers Weekly_
Praise for James Swainโs Midnight Rambler
โMidnight Rambler kept me up all night long. . . . The only problem with Swainโs riveting thrillers is they end.โ
โTess Gerritsen, author of The Keepsake
โA sturdy thriller . . . [Swain] uses language with such blunt force he could be hammering in nails.โ
โThe New York Times Book Review
โImmensely satisfying . . . [Hero Jack Carpenter evokes] memories of Will Graham, the FBI profiler in Thomas Harrisโ brilliant Red Dragon.โ
โThe Providence Journal
โEasily one of the best thrillers of the year, Swainโs tense, gritty tale is virtually impossible to put down.โ
โLansing State Journal
โMoves like a bullet train on overdrive.โ
โMichael Connelly