Deceived (Hannah Smith Series #2)

by Randy Wayne White

Overview

An almost twenty-year-old unsolved murder from Florida’s pot-hauling days gets Hannah Smith’s attention, but so does a more immediate problem. A private museum devoted solely to the state’s earliest settlers and pioneers has been announced, and many of Hannah’s friends and neighbors in Sulfur Wells are being pressured to make contributions.

The problem is the whole thing is a scam, and when Hannah sets out to uncover who’s behind it, she discovers that things are even worse than she thought. The museum scam is a front for a real estate power play, her entire village is in danger of being wiped out—and the forces behind it have no intention of letting anything, or anyone, stand in their way.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780425270158
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	08/05/2014
Series:	Hannah Smith Series , #2
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	264,520
Product dimensions:	4.20(w) x 7.50(h) x 1.10(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Randy Wayne White is the author of the Doc Ford and Hannah Smith novels. He is also the author of a number of nonfiction collections and of a cookbook. A onetime veteran fishing guide, he lives in an old house built on an Indian mound and spends much of his free time windsurfing, playing baseball, and hanging out at Doc Ford’s Rum Bar & Grille on Sanibel Island, Florida.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“A heroine who’s just as stubborn and capable and even more appealing [than White’s Doc Ford].”—Kirkus Reviews

“[An] entertaining crime thriller.”—Publishers Weekly

“White does pure suspense as well as anyone.”—Booklist

“[Randy Wayne White] raises the bar of the action thriller.”—The Miami Herald

Editorial Reviews

A heroine who’s just as stubborn and capable and even more appealing [than White’s Doc Ford].”—Kirkus Reviews

“[An] entertaining crime thriller.”—Publishers Weekly

“White does pure suspense as well as anyone.”—Booklist

“[Randy Wayne White] raises the bar of the action thriller.”—The Miami Herald

From the Publisher

At the start of bestseller White’s suspenseful second Hannah Smith novel (after 2012’s Gone), a 100-pound tarpon leaps out of the water onto Smith’s charter boat, knocking two men overboard, and Smith spots a shark heading their way. The scene sets the tone for this entertaining crime thriller in which Smith, drawn into a 20-year-old murder case and a real estate scam targeting senior citizens, tangles with pit bulls, an ax-wielding nemesis wearing a mask and a raincoat, and an industrial shredder and its drug-crazed operator. Doc Ford, the star of Night Moves and 19 other White novels, occasionally pops up as Smith’s love interest, but it’s Smith’s gutsy, no-nonsense attitude and fierce loyalty to her mother, Loretta, and her crime-solving pal, deputy sheriff Liberty Tupplemeyer, that gives the story its heart. White’s evocative descriptions of life on Florida’s Gulf Coast, both human and animal, win this series its rightful place in the ever-popular Florida crime fiction genre. Author tour. Agent: Esther Newberg, ICM. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

2013-08-15
Her second case finds Sanibel PI Hannah Smith (Gone, 2012) just as attractive, just as game and just as clueless. You know your day isn't off to a good start when a giant tarpon lands on the deck of your fishing boat and sweeps your two latest clients into the shark-infested waters. But even after Hannah fishes out Delmont Chatham and Joel Ransler, things continue to go wrong. Her difficult mother, Loretta, is even more fretful than usual because she hasn't heard from her old friend and bingo partner Rosanna "Pinky" Helms. Loretta's new neighbor, Dr. Alice Candor, seems determined to harass both Loretta and Hannah, maybe even to the point of getting Loretta's house condemned and Loretta committed. And since Dr. Candor and her ineffectual CPA husband, Raymond, have already pled guilty to a slew of felonies concerning their house-of-cards health care empire back in Ohio, her enmity is serious business. There are bright spots along the way. Ransler, unmasked as a special prosecutor for neighboring Senatee County, hires the inexperienced Hannah, who inherited her private eye's license from her uncle Jake, to investigate Fisherfolk, a charitable organization so patently bogus that Pinky's no-account children, Mica and Crystal, are listed as directors along with Levi Thurloe, the mentally challenged giant Hannah protected from bullying when they were in school together. And Hannah enjoys a few sweet nights with longtime series hero Doc Marion Ford (Night Moves, 2013, etc.) before he takes off for Venezuela and leaves her with only Deputy Liberty Tupplemeyer for help. The two strong women bond affectingly, but they're no great shakes as detectives. More interested in giving its heroine good scenes and good dialogue than a good mystery or the skills to solve it. The pace is so relaxed readers may find themselves nodding off.

Kirkus Reviews