"The Sound of Rain" by Gregg Olsen @Gregg_olsen #Mystery #Suspense #Thriller

 

The Plot:

Former homicide detective Nicole Foster has hit rock bottom. Driven off the force by her treacherous partner and lover, she’s flat broke and struggling with a gambling addiction. All Nicole has left is the dream of a warm bed at a homeless shelter and the haunting memories of three-year-old Kelsey Chase—whose murder case ended her career.

As Nicole obsesses over the old facts, she realizes everything about that case felt off: a disinterested mom, a suicidal pedophile, and too many questions left unanswered. When the little girl’s grieving father begs Nicole for help, she’s drawn back into the investigation…and given one shot at redemption.

But the deeper Nicole digs, the more evil she uncovers, including betrayals that hit painfully close to home. Will a shocking discovery be the key to finally getting justice for Kelsey and resurrecting her own life?

About the Author:

#1 New York Times bestselling author Gregg Olsen has written more than twenty books. Known for his ability to create vivid and fascinating narratives, he’s appeared on multiple television and radio shows and news networks, such as Good Morning America, Dateline, Entertainment Tonight, CNN, and MSNBC. In addition, Olsen has been featured in Redbook, People, and Salon magazine, as well as in the Seattle Times, Los Angeles Times, and New York Post.

Both his fiction and nonfiction works have received critical acclaim and numerous awards, including prominence on the USA Today and Wall St. Journal bestseller lists. Washington State officially selected his young adult novel, Envy, for the National Book Festival, and The Deep Dark was named Idaho Book of the Year.

A Seattle native who lives with his wife and twin daughters in rural Washington State, Olsen’s already at work on his next thriller. Connect with him via Facebook and Twitter or through his website, http://www.greggolsen.com.

Review:

I’m not sure if authors are getting better at writing mysteries or if I’m just choosing better books, but once again I really did not see the ending coming. The Sound of Rain grabbed me at the beginning and kept me burning through the pages. I found myself quitting work early to read, and staying up late. As a food addict, I identified with Nicole Foster’s need to gamble, even knowing what it does to her—whether she wins or loses—even when she’s homeless.

Nicole could have been just another addict, but she’s more than that. She’s a cop—a good cop, who can’t quite let go of that last case. The one she failed to solve. The missing child she never found. The one that ended her career. Something was off, and she can’t rest until she figures out what it is. And you won’t believe where that quest takes her. You just have to read The Sound of Rain. But make sure you have time to read the whole thing when you pick it up. Because you won’t be able to put down Gregg Olsen’s The Sound of Rain.

Author Website:  http://www.greggolsen.com

Warnings:  Violence

Length:  350 Pages

Prices:

Print:  $11.99

Digital:  $4.99

Audio:  $9.99

Buy Link:  https://amazon.com/dp/B01HOEGQJS

Thanks for visiting.

Michigan Roll by Tom Katonis

Blurb:

Ex-con and professional poker player Timothy Waverly travels to Traverse City, Michigan for a break…and falls into bed with a seductress named Midnight. She’s an out-of-towner, too, there to rescue her self-destructive brother, who has stupidly ripped off a fortune in cocaine from a vicious Chicago mobster. Now she is being chased by Shadow, a hemorrhoidal hitman who gleefully specializes in torture and rape, and Gleep, his muscle-bound henchman. The odds are stacked against her, but Waverly is a gambler who knows how to play them…

Review by Rochelle Weber:

When I was in my first semester of writing at Columbia College, Chicago, the men in my stories were too polite, so my professor made me read a book called Last Exit to Brooklyn, by Herbert Selby, Jr. Much of it was stream-of-consciousness profanity. If you aren’t familiar with stream-of-consciousness writing, it has no punctuation, capitalization, sentence structure or paragraphs.

Itsasthoughyourewritingadreamjusthewayyousawitandifyouwantanevenbetterexampletry The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner. The loosest I was able to get was having my pipe-fitter hero’s buddies meet him for breakfast the day after he meets my heroine and the conversation went something like:

“Hey John, how was last night? That was some hot piece you left with.”

“The Lady I left with was very nice, and it ain’t none a your business.”

It just about killed me to call my heroine a “piece,” to use the word “ain’t” and to use a double-negative.

If a writer came to me now and said, “Rochelle, I want to write a realistic thug,” this is the series of books to which I would refer him or her.

I didn’t like most of the people in this book. Waverly, the “hero,” makes his living by ripping off people at card tables, a dubious skill he honed as a way of preserving his sanity while in solitary confinement in prison. Clay Clemmons is a rich-kid drug dealer who decides to rip off half a million in drugs from his boss in Traverse City, Michigan, not realizing the drugs are really the property of the Chicago mob. He calls his sister, Holly (Midnight to her closest friends), to come and rescue him. Shadow and Gleep, the thugs tasked with retrieving the mob’s drugs decide to flush him out by grabbing Midnight. Waverly has some redeeming qualities. He steps in and rescues Midnight when Shadow and Gleep accost her in the parking lot of an Indian casino outside of Traverse City. Midnight is a Princess in every sense of the word. Beautiful, entitled—she assumes Waverly will simply continue to help her because crooks her well-manicured finger at him. And he does. Along the way, a lot of people die horrible deaths. The men in this book think and speak almost entirely in profanity. Women don’t have names. They aren’t even “pieces.” They’re the c-word or “snatch.”

Yet, these characters are deeply drawn. There’s a reason each of them turned out the way they did. They have back-stories. Despite my distaste for them, I kept reading. Right up to the cliff-hanger ending. Yes, this was Book One of a series, so it didn’t quite end. Part of me wants to say, life doesn’t quite end, either. But apparently there are more books that continue the story.

If you’re looking for a romance with nice people and a happily ever after, this book is not for you. If you’re looking for a huge dose of the seedy side of life occupied by thugs and realistic mafia hitmen, then the Waverly series is a great example. If your heroes are too polite and you need to learn how to write more realistic thugs, here’s your textbook. Despite the fact that I didn’t really like this book, I have to admire its craftwork. That’s why I gave it four roses.

Length:  304 Pages

Prices:

Print:  $13.99

Digital:  $3.99

Buy Link:  http://mysterythrillerbooks.com/book/michigan-roll/

You’ll notice we always include the publisher’s buy link. That’s because authors usually receive 40% of the book price from the publisher. Editors and cover artists usually receive about 5%. When you buy a book from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or another third-party vendor, they take a hefty cut and the author, editors and cover artists receive their cuts from what is left. So, if a book costs $5.99 at E-Book Publisher.com and you buy from there, the author will receive about $2.40. If you buy the book at Amazon, the author will receive about $0.83.

Downloading the file from your computer to your Kindle is as easy as transferring any file from your computer to a USB flash drive. Plug the larger USB end of your chord into a USB port on your computer and simply move the file from your “Downloads” box to your Kindle/Documents/Books directory. You can download your books onto your computer using “Save As” to a “Books” file you create and sort them into sub-folders by genre, author, or however you wish before transferring them to your Kindle. That way, if there’s a glitch with your Kindle, the books are on your computer. Your author will be happy you did when he/she sees his/her royalty statement.

Thanks for visiting. Rose, Julie, Donna, & Rochelle