Synopsis:
Its cool gulf breezes lured him from a life of
danger. Its dark undercurrents threatened to destroy him.After ten years of
living life on the edge, it was hard for Doc Ford to get that addiction to
danger out of his system. But spending each day watching the sun melt into
Dinkins Bay and the moon
rise over the mangrove trees, cooking dinner for his beautiful neighbor, and
dispensing advice to the locals over a cold beer lulled him into letting his
guard down.Then Rafe Hollins appeared.How could he refuse his old friend's
request-even if it would put him back on the firing line? Even if it would
change forever the life he'd built here on Sanibel Island?
Over the years I have enjoyed a fair few crime fiction books
set in and around Florida. A couple of names spring to mind as being near the
top of the list of my favourites – James W. Hall and Carl Hiaasen. Both of these
I have followed fairly closely, maybe not reading every book as it came out, but
acquiring them later, to add to the ever-increasing pile on Mount TBR.
Possibly, there could be another name to add to the list. I
say possibly, because I’ve only just read the first title in a series that to date
runs to 20 books. A friend tells me the wheels fall off at or around book 12, in
her opinion, but I’ve enjoyed this one enough to want to hunt down the 2nd and
I’ll stick with author White and Doc Ford for a while longer.
Ford is an ex-CIA agent now out of the business. He’s living
his life at a slower pace, getting by using his skills as a marine biologist to
supply samples to schools and colleges throughout the country. He’s formed some
easy friendships with the locals without giving away too much of himself.
Cue mayhem; a call for help from his best childhood friend,
Rafe Hollins rips apart his sedentary lifestyle. Hollins’ son has been
kidnapped and he wants to enlist Doc’s help in recovering him, in exchange for
the merchandise Hollins stole from them. When Doc goes to meet Rafe he finds a
corpse swinging in the breeze instead. With
his friend gone and his young son missing Ford starts looking into Hollins associates
and past.
As the plot develops, Ford’s investigation uncovers corruption
in Florida, smuggled artefacts and he suffers a trip back to the same Central
American war-zone that was the scene of his previous retirement.
Fairly fast-paced, interesting and at times informative, I
enjoyed reading Sanibel Flats. There’s a likeable cast of characters that White
has assembled around the Doc that I’ll look forward to meeting again.
4 from 5
I bought my copy on Amazon UK.
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