I’m an entrepreneur who was born literally within sight of the Intracoastal Waterway in South Florida. Got my first boat (a dinghy) when I was six. I used to drive an airboat on Lake Okeechobee and learned to fly back when I was a teenager. Since then, I’ve flown over a dozen different types of planes and even a helicopter. As a kid, I spent a lot of time in the Bahamas, Virgin Islands, and the Antilles. In my late teens I worked on various private sportfishing boats in Florida, Georgia, and the Bahamas. With this much time spent on, in, under, or around the water, I was destined to write coastal novels.
I have a deep and long-standing love of coastal adventure books, and Stolen Sommer is the best I’ve ever read. Yes, that’s a bold statement, but Nick Harvey’s work with this book resonated with me and backs up my choice completely. I even found myself holding my breath at a couple of points. Harvey keeps the reader guessing throughout the story with his carefully crafted characters that seem real enough to step off the pages. While that’s the ultimate goal of every author (at least it should be), few do it as well as Nick Harvey does in this great mystery that’s set in the beautiful Cayman Islands.
When the Cayman Islands police investigate a burglary, Constable Nora Sommer recognises the victim from a past she's desperate to forget.
As thefts continue, consuming the department's focus and resources, Nora can't shake her new found knowledge - a guilty man living a happy life… behind a lie.
A missing girl adds further strain, and with little evidence in either case, Nora develops an improbable theory she's determined to prove.
How far will Nora go to right the wrong one man will do anything to hide?
This is the last book in the famed Travis McGee series that MacDonald wrote before his death in 1986. At the time, this was the ultimate coastal adventure series, and it cultivated a lifelong obsession for me in this genre. I wish there had been more installments, but it wasn’t meant to be. Throughout the series MacDonald’s style continually evolved and improved, ending with his having become the dean of all the living coastal writers of the time. If you ask the top-ranked coastal adventure writers of today to list three authors that inspired their work and/or styles, MacDonald will always be at or near the top.
From a beloved master of crime fiction, The Lonely Silver Rain is one of many classic novels featuring Travis McGee, the hard-boiled detective who lives on a houseboat.
Travis McGee has luck to thank for his reputation as a first-rate salvager of stolen boats. Now Billy Ingraham, a self-made tycoon, is betting that McGee can locate his $700,000 custom cruiser. McGee isn’t so sure. He knows all too well the dangerous link between Florida boatjackings and the drug trade, and he’s vowed never to swim with the sharks—but if he wants to keep his head (AKA finances) above water, swim…
Dawn Lee was a friend and an inspiration to me. Cancer took her from us way too soon, but she left behind a large legacy of great books that were set on the Gulf coast in the panhandle of Florida. Low Tide is the first book in her Forgotten Coast Florida Suspense series which launched her into the bestseller ranks. If you ask anyone who’s read her what makes her writing so special, they’ll all tell you it’s her uniquely crafted characters. The plots and the twists of her stories are top-notch as well, but the characters are simply amazing.
In Apalachicola, Florida, sinister things are afoot, as sinister things tend to be.Lt. Maggie Redmond is called to a crime scene on St. George Island, where she is met with the body of Gregory Boudreaux. The medical examiner calls it a suicide, but no one knows that Maggie has a horrible connection to the dead man.When Gregory’s uncle, Bennett Boudreaux, the richest and scariest man in town, takes a sudden interest in Maggie, people start to wonder, Maggie included. Maggie knows he may suspect her of killing his nephew, but she finds herself slowly drawn to the man. As Maggie…
As a veteran actor of stage and screen, Sullivan is well versed in the art of movie-making. In his best-selling book, Deep Focus, he blends this along with his love of SCUBA diving and the Cayman Islands into a great coastal mystery and suspense read. As he asks in his book description, “Who wouldn’t want to shoot a movie in paradise? What could possibly go wrong?” As it turns out, plenty of things. So, grab a good sipping rum, settle into your favorite reading chair, and prepare to be entertained.
Who wouldn't want to shoot a movie in paradise? What could possibly go wrong?
Divemasters Boone Fischer and Emily Durand have left the relative bustle of Cozumel to start anew on the sleepy Sister Island of Little Cayman; population 200, give or take. In the Cayman Islands, the reefs are so spectacular and extensive, you can dive a different site every day of the year.
When a prominent film studio decides to shoot their upcoming science-fiction flick in the waters of the Caribbean island of Grand Cayman, everything initially goes well. Eccentric director Heinz Werner is brought on board, and…
I first started reading Becker with his Mac Travis series (which I also loved), but when he created Kurt Hunter, I was totally hooked. He and I both share a love for the area around Biscayne Bay, which is where he set the Kurt Hunter Mysteries. Hunter is a Park Ranger who patrols and protects the underwater national park in that area. This creates great and unique plot opportunities, of which Becker takes full advantage. Oh, and then there are the rare saltwater crocodiles that make appearances throughout Backwater Channel. Real creatures, unique to the area. Really nasty, too!
You’d think a nuclear power plant was dangerous enough …
That’s what special agent Kurt Hunter thought until, while out fishing, he witnesses a murder at the Turkey Point nuclear power plant. After being assigned the case, Kurt is pulled into the convoluted politics of Miami only to find out that the embattled power plant is only a pawn in a more deadly game.
Greed and corruption are nothing new to pristine Biscayne Bay. With the plant's miles of cooling canals providing essential habitat for several endangered species, Kurt is thrown into a rift between warring environmentalists and power-hungry corporate…
Some crime figures consider avoiding indictments to be a deadly serious business, with murder as the best solution to the problem. One recently reformed man is determined to save the lives of his friends as well as the new woman in his life, even though it means exposing his own criminal past. He could end up going to prison, though first, he’ll need to survive. But sometimes people with everything to lose can be more dangerous than those with nothing to lose at all. “Rut” Rutledge is determined to prove it.
Writer, reader, editor, reviewer, publisher… those are all parts of me. With a lifetime of experience in the “words” industry, I have a pretty good handle on what makes a book not just good, but hot. I say this with the understanding that each reader brings their own histories to the reading experience, and what one person may like, another may not. Nonetheless, I offer you my professional and personal favorites in the mystery/thriller/suspense categories. It is my sincere hope that you find these books as addictive as I’d found them. Superb and clever writing, engaging characters, unpredictable plots—yes, please! Though I occasionally step outside my comfort zone, I'm consistently drawn back to these categories.
Liza O’Connell was a horror buff in every sense of the word. But there was one deadly nightmare she would never be able to talk about … her own. A friend murdered. A business in trouble. A marriage struggling to survive. And that’s just the beginning.
When salon owner Carrie King discovers Liza dead in the back room of her shop, everyone becomes a suspect, even her. As tensions in the community rise, so does the death toll, and now the local cops believe there’s a serial killer on the loose. The question is … are the two investigations connected?…
Liza O’Connell was a horror buff in every sense of the word. But there was one deadly nightmare she would never be able to talk about … her own.
A friend murdered.
A business in trouble.
A marriage struggling to survive.
And that’s just the beginning.
When salon owner Carrie King discovers Liza dead in the back room of her shop, everyone becomes a suspect, even her. As tensions in the community rise, so does the death toll, and now the local cops believe there’s a serial killer on the loose. The question is … are the two investigations connected?…
