Book Blog: Deep Dark Night, Lori Anderson Series Book 4, Steph Broadribb
Book Blog: Deep Dark Night, Lori Anderson Series Book 4, Steph Broadribb
It’s happened again.
I’ve never met Anne Cater face to face. She is a book blogger, book tour organizer, Facebook group moderator for the Book Connectors, and all around amazing person. I hope someday our paths cross. She has become one of my favorite people that I know only through the Internet.
But I have a major bone to pick with her. She is way too good at her job! I get these delightful emails from her: join this blog tour, excellent book, terrific author, small press publisher, yada yada yada. And she is always right, so I often say yes. Then I run into a book like Deep Dark Night by Steph Broadribb and realize that it is book 4 in a series. Anne did not lie. She said it could be read as a standalone novel, and it can. But now, I don’t want to. It was too good. I want to go back in time and read the first three. I want to buy everything Steph Broadribb has written and just inhale all of it.
And I can’t afford the time or money to do that every time Anne introduces me to a new author mid-series!
Back to the book. Lori Anderson is mother to a delightful little girl, Dakota. They live in Florida where she and her partner J.T. are bounty hunters. In a previous book, FBI Special Agent Alex Monroe did something for Lori, something that incurred a great debt. Now, he wants her to pay him back.
Monroe has been after the head of a Chicago mob family for years. Now, with Anderson’s help, he has a plan to catch him. This mobster has had his heart set on getting a valuable chess set, not so much because it is monetarily valuable but because it has personal meaning to him. Monroe has come into possession of this chess set. A sting is set up. Lori and J.T. go to Chicago and arrange to pass the chess set over to the mobster. The plan is for Lori to participate in a high stakes poker game where the chess set is to be collateral. The poker game will end with her handing over the chess set to the criminal, thereby putting him in possession of stolen property, and the FBI will then swoop in and make the arrest.
No one planned on a power outage trapping the poker players on a top floor of a skyscraper!
As the city is plunged into darkness, another player emerges. This one is dangerous, knowing secrets about the poker players, knowing their fears and their weaknesses, and pitting them against one another in a game with deadly stakes. It will take all of the courage and cunning Lori and J.T. possess to escape alive.
Steph Broadribb has created a character in Lori Anderson who is tough, bold, intelligent, and decisive. She is a bounty hunter because she likes making the streets safer. She is a loving mother, a committed friend and partner, and she pays her debts. She may despise special agent Monroe (he may be one of the good guys, but he is not a good guy), but she owes him and she will pay. Lori is believable. She has a powerful mix of strengths and weaknesses. She can accept help but doesn’t always allow herself to ask for it. She is far too used to handling things on her own, and this sometimes puts her into situations that were avoidable. Her partner and lover (and father to Dakota) J.T. is an equally great character. He, too, is a strong person with flaws that make him more human. His love and loyalty to Lori and Dakota makes him very easy to cheer for.
The action is almost non-stop from the opening scene to the conclusion. As the tensions mount at the top of the skyscraper and the bodies begin to pile up, there is very real question about whether Lori and J.T. will escape with their lives. Who will live and who will die is often surprising. In key moments people show their true colors: strength, compassion, loyalty, betrayal, cowardice, vengeance. Characters who show one side of themselves when the lights are on become very different when the challenges of the darkness mount. This novel was a breathtaking thrill ride.
One thing I noticed with my American eyes was that this was written for a British audience. Although the slang and idioms rang true for America, I “realised” the spelling was not changed to accommodate readers over here. For me that kind of enhanced the charm of the book–but then I felt Harry Potter should have been searching for the “Philosopher’s Stone” in the American editions. Not a criticism, just an observation.
Steph Broadribb has created compelling characters, flawed heroes and complex villains, and an action-packed book that takes readers on an exciting journey to the heights and depths of Chicago. And, darn it Anne Cater, I may now have to go get the rest of the series.
My thanks to Random Things Blog Tours and their tireless leader Anne Cater for organizing the blog tour, and to Steph Broadribb and Orenda Books for my copy of this book. This review reflects the opinions of Scintilla. For other perspectives on this book, check out the rest of the Deep Dark Night blog tour reviews.
Book Blog: Deep Dark Night, Lori Anderson Series Book 4, Steph Broadribb
Oh David! You made me smile so much today! Thank you xx