SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST reviews - UPDATED

(Click on quotes to go to full review).
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"Another superior thriller — fast, tough and nasty – without a single extra sentence." – KIRKUS REVIEWS (starred review).

* "Lean, poetic prose ... For fans of noir, this is among the best of the current breed." – BOSTON GLOBE

* "You will want to read SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST at least three times: once quickly (you won’t be able to help doing so); once slowly, to savor it; and once simply to admire, line by line, how Stroby demonstrates how the job of writing noir crime fiction is fittingly and properly done." – BOOK REPORTER.COM

* "As taut and tension-filled as an aerial artist's tightrope." – DAVID MARSHALL JAMES

* "Continues the hot streak of this engaging series... SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST is a heist novel that breathes." – MYSTERY PEOPLE

* "Wallace Stroby knows how to move a story. Fast. ... At no point in the novel does Stroby give the reader a chance to wander off and wonder. You just keep turning pages." – THE STAR-LEDGER/NJ.COM

* "Stroby’s superb writing, scene-setting and characters take you into another world." – HEY, THERE'S A DEAD GUY IN THE LIVING ROOM

* "As the finale approaches, Stroby skillfully ratchets up the tension. We get taken down to the wire and then some. ... Like Elmore Leonard, he shows us how fragile the connection is between machismo and angst, bravado and dread." – OPEN LETTERS MONTHLY

* "The book is violent and often dark, and at times extremely touching .... The reader is sitting on pins and needles as the book hurtles toward its inevitable climax." – MYSTERY SCENE

* "One of the more compelling female criminals in mystery fiction... Stroby nails this taut, gripping contest between well-matched opponents." – PUBLISHERS WEEKLY (starred review)

* "Violence permeates the action-filled pages replete with fascinating characters in this excellent novel." – RT BOOK REVIEWS (4 out of 4 stars)

* "This is why genre fiction can be good. This book feels real." – JEN A. MILLER

* "As the finale approaches, the writing style burns down to its hard essence ... The shootouts have been staged in many a gangster - and western - tale. But when they're done as skillfully as this, who cares?" – BOOKLIST

Mystery Scene magazine on SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST

Mystery Scene magazine finds SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST "violent and often dark, and at times extremely touching ... The reader is sitting on pins and needles as the book hurtles toward its inevitable climax." Read the full review here.

Romantic Times on SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST

The Romantic Times gives 4 (out of 4) Stars to SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST in its latest issue.

SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST
by Wallace Stroby

Genre: Mystery/Suspense/Thriller, Suspense
RT Rating: **** FOUR (out of Four) STARS

Professional thief and stone-cold killer Crissa Stone is back, lining up another caper in burned-out Detroit. Her long-buried conscience leads her further into danger and, perhaps, the end of it all. Violence permeates the action-filled pages replete with fascinating characters in this excellent novel. The plan is to steal more than half-a-million in Mexican drug money, helped by an insider, another friend and Crissa’s partner, Larry. Although they organize to the nth degree, it all goes terribly wrong when it becomes clear that the informant has turned on them. Ex-cop Burke has always played fast and loose with the law, taking and giving bribes and worse. Now that he’s an independent investigator, he alternates between doing impossible jobs and hitting the bottle. When an old contact asks him to track down the thieves that ripped him off, he says he’ll do it — for a price. When he discovers one of the perps is a woman, it puts him on Crissa’s trail.

(MINOTAUR, Dec., 288 pp., $24.99)
Reviewed By: Donna M. Brown

Booklist on SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST

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SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST gets starred review from Publishers Weekly

The Nov. 30 issue of Publishers Weekly includes this starred review of SHOOT THE WOMAN FIRST, which it calls "taut, gripping." (Click on images to enlarge).