Next Of Kin-Sharon Sala

Next Of Kin

Sharon Sala

Mira, Jan 31 2012, $7.99

ISBN: 9780778313120



In the Los Angeles area, while staying at a friend’s house Beth Venable witnesses a mob kill, but the murderer knows someone observed the homicide. The killer murders Beth’s friend who he assumes is the person who saw him. The FBI places her in a safe house until she can give testimony at the trial, but a predator stalks her. Two more failed safe houses persuade Beth that the Feds are incompetent, traitorous or both. She flees them and her killer for the anonymity of her Kentucky family in the Appalachian.



Besides her clan rallying around the prodigal child’s return, Beth’s former sweetheart Ryal Walker welcomes her back with a need for a second chance. While Beth considers staying at her old Kentucky home with Ryal, her persistent predator comes to the obscure mountain ridge seeking to kill Beth and anyone in his way.



The theme of this Rebel Ridge romantic suspense has been used a lot, but talented Sharon Sala makes it feel like she is the first author to use a hit man coming after a witness-damsel in distress. The lead couple is a delightful second chance pairing while her kin bring to life the dirt roads and shacks of Appalachia compared to “L.A. is a great big freeway” (Do you know the way to San Jose?). What really makes the thriller work is brave bodacious Beth who refuses to fold just because a pro stalks her.



Harriet Klausner


In Harlan County, Kentucky, the two cash crops are marijuana and organ harvesting. U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens (see Pronto and Riding the Rap) investigates who removed the kidneys from drug dealer Angel Arenas. His inquiry leads to weed dealing brothers Dickie and Coover Crowe who expanded their operations into the lucrative harvesting of organs to sell back at 10K to the donor; the Fed knows this pair’s combined IQ would remain in single digits so someone medically competent is the brains of the operation.




The Crowe family owns mountain land that a coal company covets. Executive Carol Conlon will kill anyone who gets in her firm’s mountaintop removal operation. Givens follows a deadly feud to the Crowe clan and the mining company.



Raylan pursues stoned bank robbing strippers. The clues lead to Jackie Nevada who pays for her college tuition at Butler by playing poker.



More novellas and shorts (there is additional vignettes) than a novel, the tie between the tales is Raylan. The zany tales are over the top of Black Mountain as the madcap police procedurals are fun to read while satirizing American capitalism especially through the various legal and illegal industries and the caricature villains and villainesses. Fans will enjoy Elmore Leonard’s latest madcap thriller.



Harriet Klausner









Next Of Kin

Sharon Sala

Mira, Jan 31 2012, $7.99

ISBN: 9780778313120



In the Los Angeles area, while staying at a friend’s house Beth Venable witnesses a mob kill, but the murderer knows someone observed the homicide. The killer murders Beth’s friend who he assumes is the person who saw him. The FBI places her in a safe house until she can give testimony at the trial, but a predator stalks her. Two more failed safe houses persuade Beth that the Feds are incompetent, traitorous or both. She flees them and her killer for the anonymity of her Kentucky family in the Appalachian.



Besides her clan rallying around the prodigal child’s return, Beth’s former sweetheart Ryal Walker welcomes her back with a need for a second chance. While Beth considers staying at her old Kentucky home with Ryal, her persistent predator comes to the obscure mountain ridge seeking to kill Beth and anyone in his way.



The theme of this Rebel Ridge romantic suspense has been used a lot, but talented Sharon Sala makes it feel like she is the first author to use a hit man coming after a witness-damsel in distress. The lead couple is a delightful second chance pairing while her kin bring to life the dirt roads and shacks of Appalachia compared to “L.A. is a great big freeway” (Do you know the way to San Jose?). What really makes the thriller work is brave bodacious Beth who refuses to fold just because a pro stalks her.



Harriet Klausner