Beach Reading.

I didn't go to the beach to read this, dammit, and I need a vacation.

That's not Jim Born's fault.

OK, maybe I should start over.

Thanks to Jim's generosity, I picked up this book and some grits while I was in South Carolina and I enjoyed both. One was good with a vodka tonic and the other was good with fried eggs and both made me happy as a pup.

As you know, I don't do reviews. One, I'm lazy and two, who gives a fuck what I think?

(Did I mention that I really need a vacation?)

So if you're looking for some dissection of plot here, forget it. Just know that Jim Born goes around armed most of the time and it's in your best interest to buy his books and like them. Innocent people have been swept up "accidentally" in drug raids before.

So what's it going to be, $2000 for a defense attorney or $20 for a book? Just shut up and get out your wallet.

Born's working with a new character here, an ATF agent named Duarte, a guy who's quick to kick a bad guy in the teeth, but not so fast with a quip or the ladies. And that's fine.

The other characters are good and one killer is surpringly likeable. The plot unfolds as it should, and comes to a point where it's hard to trust anyone, just like in real life.

I ghost-wrote a novel with a plot that's similar (hey, how many are there, really?) and an ending a lot less satisfying than Jim's. My ending was so bad that I think Mary Worth figured in the denouement somehow, but I'm not sure. I've repressed that.

But Jim's work is solid and a good actioner to take along with the Coppertone. I would if I was going on vacation.

Goddammit.

Maybe I can contract some flesh-eating bacteria* that will put me in the hospital for a few weeks. No, it's not a vacation, but at least I'll get caught up on my reading.

*Now Born will bitch forever about the time I mentioned his book and flesh-eating bacteria in the same post.