Customer Reviews

Cut and Run

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In Jeff Abbott's third Whit Mosley novel, "Cut and Run," the unorthodox Port Leo, Texas judge Whit Mosley bends the law to the breaking point.

He is searching for his mother, who abandoned the family when Whit was a small child---he is investigating his own past as well.

His mother left with a ne'er-do-well who had stolen a large sum of money from the mob. On the run, she murders the abusive thief and returns the money to the Detroit Mafia---eventually becoming their money manager and remaining out of sight.

Thirty years later Whit's pursuit begins. An ordeal of double-crosses, frame-ups, reprehensible betrayers, murder, conniving dames, money laundering and topless clubs are just a few of the roadblocks Whit encounters.

It is nonstop cat and mouse after Whit initially locates his mother. Running together, it is impossible to know whom is ally, whom is adversary.

Fast paced, a superb supporting cast and crisp dialogue propel the plot.

Whit's archangel Gooch steals every scene he appears in.

A very enjoyable series.

In Port Leo, Texas the doctors have given his beloved father, who raised Judge Whit Mosely and his five brothers, four months to live. As such Whit wants his mother Ellen, who abandoned the seven Mosely males decades ago, to apologize for what she did to all of them before his dad dies. He hires private investigator Harry Chyme to make inquiries though his father did just that when the trail was warm with no success.

Harry thinks out of the box tracing Ellen to Montana where she had run off to with a bank embezzler. Then he traces her in Detroit where she cut a deal with the Bellini mob, who relocated with her to Houston. As Whit confronts Ellen, he becomes embroiled in a mob deal involving a five-million-dollar Miami connection and double crosses that test his moral system to the core. Will he choose to protect the person who deserted him or will he opt to obey his conscience. He is encouraged to do so by Claudia Salazaar, the woman he loves.

CUT AND RUN is an exhilarating thriller that runs on two levels. First there is the mob scenario with its double dealings in which Ellen is in the middle. Then there is Whit's ethical dilemma even when murder influences the equation. Thus the audience receives a powerful novel that will add to Jeff Abbott's growing reputation for suspense.

Harriet Klausner

I was thrilled to walk into my local bookstore one day and discover that Jeff Abbott had written another book featuring my favorite character of his, Whit Mosely. I was a little disappointment that this book was mostly not set on the Gulf Coast of Texas like the others, but the plot so good that my disappointment faded.

This book plunges into Whit's past showing us more of the background that developed his character while immersing us into mob life. This book has many twist and turns. I found myself guessing who had the money and was still wrong. Cut and Run will take you on a journey that you won't want to put down.

If you haven't yet followed this series , now is the time to come on board. How much value do we place on a parent, who has treated us badly? Do we come to their aid? Do we chance all we have? Interesting answers here in an action packed thriller.

Jeff Abbott is a Texas author who can really write an exciting novel, with well-drawn characters and a plot which twists and turns often enough to satisfy almost any reader. In this book, Judge Whit Mosley decides to track down his long-absent mother in order for her to explain the desertion of her family to Whit's dying father. In the years since she walked out on her husband and six sons, Ellen Mosley has transformed herself into a member of the mob, living in Houston and specializing in money laundering for her boss, Tommy Bellini. As Bellini lays dying, his son Paul manages to make the family vulnerable to attacks from the outside. He bungles a drug deal and ends up without the drugs or the money. Ellen, who is now called Eve, is implicated in the robbery of Paul's money, but she is innocent. What then transpires is too complicated to try to describe, but basically all of the bad guys are trying to end up with the drugs AND the money. Whit stumbles into this situation and is soon entangled in illegal activities which threaten his career and his mother's life. Abbott manages to untangle the complicated situation at the end and to create an interesting story along the way.

I have had Jeff Abbott on my list of authors to read for some while. While this book did not overly impress me, I can see where Whit Mosley would be a much more entertaining character given another setting.
The book centers around Mosley, a Justice of the Peace in a small Texas town. Mosley's father is on his death bed and Whit sets out to find his mother who left the family thirty years previous. What he finds is a mother who has re-invented herself as an accountant for a mob family. Whit finds himself involved in a plot that includes murder, deception and vengeance.
While certainly readable, this book did not engross me as I had hoped it would, but it kept me interested enough to persuade me to give this author another try.