Available:*
Library | Call Number | Status |
|---|---|---|
Searching... R.H. Stafford Library (Woodbury) | FICTION BER | Searching... Unknown |
Bound With These Titles
On Order
Summary
Summary
Having left his life of crime behind, former getaway driver Charles "Shake" Bouchon has finally realized the dream of owning his own restaurant in Belize. Unfortunately, to do so he's had to go deep in debt to a murderous local drug lord named Baby Jesus. And when Shake thwarts an attempted hit on an elderly customer named Quinn, things go from bad to worse.
Next thing Shake knows, his restaurant's gone up in flames and he's on the run from Baby Jesus, two freelance assassins, and a beautiful but ferocious FBI agent. Out of options, Shake has to turn to the mysterious Quinn for help. Suddenly Shake's up to his neck in a dangerous score that he'll never pull off unless he can convince an even more dangerous ex-girlfriend to join him.
Edgar Award Nominee for Best Paperback Original Novel
Reviews (2)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Berney takes his rightful place as heir to Elmore Leonard with this witty and nimble comedic thriller, a sequel to his first novel, Gunshot Straight (2010). Charles "Shake" Bouchon, once a getaway driver for the Armenian mafia in Southern California, wants to go straight. After a second stint in prison for grand theft auto, he's bought a restaurant in Belize. The food's good, but business is slow, and Shake is falling behind on his payments to Baby Jesus, the local drug lord who bankrolled this new venture. But that's just the beginning of Shake's problems: when a mysterious operator named Quinn is nearly killed in Shake's dining room, Shake is drawn into a circuitous plot involving fertility tourism, exotic animal smuggling, a murderous oil and gas executive (he's in fracking, of course), and an Ocean's 11-style heist of a priceless artifact that Quinn tricks Shake into believing is the nose of the Sphinx. The exotic locales are vibrant, the supporting cast larger than life, and the plot hums along without a wasted page. Agent: Richard Parks. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Once again, Shake Bouchon is determined to go straight. He's the proud owner of a restaurant on Ambergris Cay, an island off the coast of Belize. But in short order, Shake is the target of three different hit men and a beautiful and tenacious FBI agent determined to make him rat out the L.A.-based Armenian Mob featured in his first misadventure (Gutshot Straight, 2010). Most of the heat is initially aimed at Harrigan Quinn, a devil-may-care septuagenarian and possibly a former contract spook for the CIA, but by saving Quinn's life, Shake becomes another target. Soon, his restaurant explodes. With $65 in his pocket and assassins in hot pursuit, Shake flees Belize, with Quinn in tow. But and there are always buts in Berney's plots Quinn pitches a lucrative con in Cairo designed to get both these amiable mavericks back on their financial feet. Trouble follows, of course, complete with hitters. Berney's plot makes as many sharp turns as San Francisco's famously curvy Lombard Street. His characters, especially the over-the-top Quinn and pretty much every female in the book, are brilliantly drawn. His portrait of Ambergris Cay suggests that he really knows that quirky, charming island, and the dialogue is crisp and often funny, or laced with irony. Gutshot Straight made Booklist's 2010 Best Crime Novels list. Whiplash River should be a contender for this year's list.--Gaughan, Thomas Copyright 2010 Booklist
