Customer Reviews

Boost

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For professional car thief, Sam Hill, stealing a gold 1965 Thunderbird for a paying customer is no big deal. The second he opens the trunk and discovers a corpse with track marks on his arms and a wire taped to his chest, Sam changes his mind. In a suspiciously short time, the cops are banging on Sam's door, asking about a missing DEA informant and the stolen Thunderbird. Sam needs to find out who set him up, and why. Once he does, the question becomes what to do about it.

Boost is a light, fast-paced novel that centers around risky cat and mouse games between hero and villain. I use the term "hero" loosely because Sam Hill has his flaws. Although I liked Sam a lot, I wouldn't want my daughter dating someone like him, which says a lot about author Steve Brewer's talent for creating interesting, edgy leading characters. His secondary characters, though, were the usual thugs with guns and attitude. Despite the stereotypes, the dialogue was clever, chapters short, pacing terrific, and violent scenes minimal.

If you want a break from grim, complex stories about social decay, serial killers, or dysfunctional families in serious need of rehab, then Boost is a great choice.

Sam Hill has made a very nice life for himself in Albuquerque, New Mexico, by stealing cars -- but not just any car, only collectible cars fetching the highest prices for a professional thief. One night Sam steals a superb 1965 Thunderbird from a lawyer's house. In the car's trunk he finds the corpse of a police informant with a bullet hole between the eyes. To make matters worse, the cops are raiding the garage where Sam had planned to deliver the T-Bird. Sam has been set up with the cops on his trail, and gangsters on the payroll of drug dealer and car collector Phil Ortiz now gunning for him as well. It seems Sam had boosted Ortiz's favorite car! Author Steve Brewer has written a high octane thriller where the car thieves are the good guys and the action is riveting from first page to last with a plot that has more twists that your favorite pretzel! Boost is especially recommended reading. Attention Hollywood, this is the stuff of which blockbuster movies are made of!

Like his charming Bullets of last year, Steve Brewer's Boost is another breezy romp featuring a raucous rogue's gallery of offbeat crooks, cops and hoods.

Sam Hill lives to steal cars -- not just any cars but exotic classics collectors lust for and that fetch the biggest bucks on the black market.

Unfortunately, Sam steals from a guy one never wants to cross, a violent drug dealer who loves only one thing in life more than money: his car. That theft sets off a chain reaction resulting in a wave of violence and hilarity that sweeps across Albuquerque like Patton through the Germans.

Like Elmore Leonard, the writer whose work his most resembles, Brewer writes with a light and deft touch, bringing style and wit to the crime genre, along with a pleasing gift for character and dialogue.

Steve Brewer is a master at weaving quirky characters into a mystery, carrying the reader along a wonderful journey full of action, humour, and intrigue. But it's the characters that he so good at developing. Like Elmore Leonard, he leaves the reader begging for more.

If you want a classic car and you have no scruples about where it comes from, you need to make some kind of connection with Sam Hill. This connection is probably going to be through Mitch's Auto Salvage and Robin Mitchell, the current owner and the woman Sam lusts after. Sam steals cars for Robin.

The current job is a lovely 1965 T-Bird. The good news is the boost went off without a hitch. The bad news is the wired for sound but very dead junkie in the trunk. Neither Sam nor Robin know why the body is there, but it does complicate their lives. Someone has let the DEA know to check out Sam Hill in connection with their missing informant.

Once Sam figures out who is after him, and after him with a vengeance, the games begin. Sam has a protege, Billy Suggs, and his own personal muscle, Way-Way Anderson. Way-Way is a BIG man. The three men, with some reluctant help from Robin, enter into a testosterone-driven contest with the local drug lord to see whose huevos are the biggest.

The local law and the DEA get pulled into the fray. The local law would like nothing better than to put Sam Hill away for good and all. The DEA just wants to find out what happened to their informant, and they think Sam Hill should be the one to replace him. Sam thinks not.

The not-so-innocent bystanders just want the whole mess to go away, because they tend to be the ones getting really hurt. There is more than enough violence to go around, which isn't surprising considering the participants.

Brewer has written an entertaining novel of suspense. The pace is almost rollicking; Brewer's sense of humor keeps the action from getting too intense. The characters are great fun, even the bad guys, although if one really thinks about what is happening, it isn't all that funny. Brewer manages to keep those thoughts out of our minds.

If you like action, humor, good characterization, and a plot that moves right along - BOOST is almost certainly a book for you. Brewer has written two other stand-alones, the Bubba Mabry series, the Drew Gavin series, and a non-fiction work; there is plenty out there if you want to read more of Brewer's work. I'll be keeping an eye out for it, that's for sure.

He looks like an all-American guy but for the last two decades he has made a living by boosting collectible cars. He has amassed a fortune but he still needs the adrenaline rush which is why he agrees to the request of Robin of Mitch's Automotive Salvage to steal a 1965 Thunderbird. Before dropping the car off at Robin's he stops at a 7-Eleven for a drink. The police who are also there admire the car but when a phone rings in the trunk of the car Sam is forced to answer it to allay any suspicions the police might have.

When he pops the trunk, he finds a corpse; he drives to a storage place he rents. The dead man has old tracks on his arms and is wearing a wire. He finds out who brokered the deal and then "chats" with Ernesto Morales who informs him that Phil Ortiz, who is heavily into drug trafficking, wanted Sam to steal that car. Sam concludes that it was Ortiz who placed the anonymous call to Albuquerque police Lt. Vic Stanton about the stolen car. When Sam finds out why Ortiz set him up, he drops the car with the body in the trunk outside Ortiz's estate to raise the ante in a deadly game.

Although there are some violent scenes in this crime thriller, the author writes in an upbeat manner so that there is a lot of humor in BOOST. The protagonist is an anti-hero who is easy to like and readers will find him adorable for his practical jokes and his protective nature towards those he cares about. Steve Brewer is so good at characterizations that he even makes the villain seem plausible.

Harriet Klausner

Just throwing my two cents in for yet another winner from Steve Brewer. Pick this one up. You won't regret it.