Ashes and Bones

Delta Crossroads Trilogy, Book #3

By Stacy Green

ISBN#  9781495397202

Author’s Website:  http://www.stacygreen.net/

Brought to you by OBS reviewer Sammy

Synopsis:

Just when Jaymee Ballard’s life seems to be on track, a massive derecho attacks the Delta Crossroads sowing destruction in its path. Her boyfriend, investigative journalist Nick Samuels, comes up missing, and she fears the worst.

Nick’s abandoned car contains evidence of his involvement uncovering a controversial case mired in political power and greed. While her friend and local detective, Cage Foster, heads up the inquiry into Nick’s kidnapping, Jaymee finds it impossible to sit back and do nothing.

Enlisting the help of her best friend, Dani Evans, Jaymee discovers a trail leading to the dangerous and secretive Dixie Mafia. Facing a fraudulent Confederate artifact scheme, dark local history, and a powerful enemy lurking in the shadows, the two friends find themselves holding the key to not only Nick’s disappearance, but a shameful town secret someone will kill to protect. (Goodreads)

Review:

What can I say, this was a wonderful story and tied up so many things in an interesting way, with surprises around many corners.

One of the things I love about this author is her characters aren’t perfect, the story starts out with Jaymee saying she is jealous of Dani and her looks, which was how she felt in the other story. I love when an author doesn’t change the characters completely in the different books. That’s not to say that they haven’t grown, they have, they still have insecurities and their personalities didn’t do an about face.

Nick is a difficult character to warm up to not just in this book, but the other one he was in as well. I liked that he finally grew in this story and knows what’s important. It took a long time coming but he did get there. Yay!

I would take a 1/2 star away for the tstl things Jaymee and Dani did, but it worked and the other things in this storyline were so awesome I bumped it up to the 5 star rating.

What an absolutely wonderful way this author has with the “bad” people, villians in her stories. They are so complex, some are so disgusting while others have things that make them still likeable, this is one of this authors strongest skills. Her villains to date are not exactly what one would think of, but work perfectly within her stories. Bravo!

The other fabulous skill this author has is when she writes you can feel the things she is writing about, it’s never bogged down with to much or to little, really done perfectly. When she writes about a storm you feel like you are in the middle of it. This is something I’ve seen in all of her books. Excellent writing. Plus, she always, or I should say in every story I’ve read written by Stacy, adds some very interesting history.

This story can be read alone and it will be a wonderful read. I would however, highly recommend reading these stories in order, so you can enjoy all the richness of the characters and where they came from and how they came to be who they are in this story.

I Recommend this for anyone wanting to read a truly well written story, the pieces fit together and when the puzzle is  complete it isn’t what you think it was going to be. I loved it. Really nice mystery with great bits of history and characters that are real. Another hit for me.

*An ebook copy of this title was supplied to OBS in exchange for an honest review*