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Product Description
Reviewers nationwide have joined such writers as Elmore Leonard, Tony Hillerman, and Stephen King in praising Standiford's John Deal novels-but his new Deal may be the best one yet.
On a trip to Key West to talk with a wealthy developer about a new building project, Deal stops to help a young black man who is being rousted by police on a lonely beach road. The young man is appreciative-which makes it all the more shocking two days later, when he turns up dead. What happened? The police won't say. The locals won't talk. An old girlfriend appears, but Deal can't tell if she's there to help or hinder him. References keep being made to a seventy-year-old tale of piracy and murder as if it should mean something to him. All Deal knows for sure is that the more he looks into it all, the more layers he finds, and the more people seem to have died. And that, unless he can get to the bottom of it soon, the next death just might be his own.
Filled with intense, character-driven action and rich, textured prose, Bone Key proves again why "Standiford's stories are some of the best suspense novels out there" (Rocky Mountain News).
Amazon.com Review
A new Deal novel is cause for celebration, as fans of Les Standiford's series featuring the Florida contractor know. This time around, Deal's complicated family ties lure him from Miami to Key West to bid on a huge project being developed by entrepreneur Franklin Stone, an old friend of his father's. It's always a good idea to get a series hero away from his usual haunts, even if the Keys aren't that far from Florida's gold coast; the geography of the setting is key to this somewhat run-of-the-mill tale of buried treasure, vintage wine, and murder. What makes this mystery worthwhile isn't the plot, it's the people; instead of Vernon Driscoll, Deal's usual sidekick, Standiford gives us Russell Straight, and instead of Janice, Deal's estranged wife, the author sets up Annie Dodds, Deal's college girlfriend, as his love interest; it's the author's skill at characterization that renders them real rather than stereotypical, multifaceted rather than one-dimensional. Not the best of the series, but still well worth reading. --Jane Adams
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