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Stuff to Die For

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Set in Miami, "Stuff To Die For" is the story of Skip Moore and James Lessor, two guys who grew up in poverty watching other people travel in their the luxury cars, going to fancy clubs and elegant restaurants, and enjoying their money. Now in their twenties the two decide on a new get-rich-scheme (they've had a lot of them in the past). But things start going strange when they discover a severed finger in an envelope along with a ransom note. As they involve themselves into solving a kidnap caper, the two become enmeshed a world of family secrets, Cuban thugs, a gun-toting philosopher, a CIA agent, and a group of shadowy people plotting the overthrow of the Cuban government. Highly entertaining and enthusiastically recommended for personal reading lists and community library collections, "Stuff To Die For" is a superbly crafted, action-packed story of mysteries, explosions, car chases, gun battles, a quick eye for a buck, and two somewhat flawed heroes trying to figure things out and not get killed in the process!

Book Title: Stuff to Die For

Author: Don Bruns

Oceanview Publishing

Release Date: September 1, 2007

Binding: Hardcover

Reviewer: Lee Carper

The latest novel by award-winning author Don Bruns, Stuff to Die For, features James Lessor and Skip Moore, a bumbling Laurel and Hardy duo who set out to do the right thing, but only manage to find themselves deeper and deeper in a comical web of intrigue.

Skip sells security systems, while James works as a cook at a local restaurant. They live in a worn-out apartment in a worn-out section of South Florida. Best pals since childhood, Skip, seemingly the level-headed of the two, tries to take his friend in stride, as James continually seeks new business ventures to make his fortune. In his latest endeavor, James inherits money from an aunt and purchases a box truck, declaring: "... Moore and Lessor, or Lessor and Moore. Have truck, will haul." And so begins their adventure.

Skip's girlfriend Emily lands the men their first job, hauling "stuff" for Jackie Fuentes. When Skip and James unload the cargo, they find a bloody human finger in an unopened mail envelope. Because this is a lucrative job and they want their money, they decide they'd better deliver this "mail" to the intended recipient, Jackie's ex-husband Rick. Rick hires the men to investigate the case of the severed finger, and Skip and James end up knee-deep in a possible Cuban takeover, a kidnapping, and some very dangerous criminals. Included in their escapade is an enigmatic man named Angel, whom we never really get to know in great detail, but plays an important role nonetheless.

I'll admit, as a reader I tend to lean more toward hard-boiled mysteries, but this novel couldn't help but draw me in. Don Bruns succeeds in making this an immensely satisfying read.

If you enjoy interesting characters, and a combination of humor and intrigue, then Stuff to Die For, is stuff to die for.

James Lessor and Skip Moore have been friends since childhood. James has always been scheming on ways for the two to make a fortune in business and Skip has followed along into each venture. Some schemes had gotten them into trouble, some hadn't, but none of them had really worked. The latest plan James has hatched has them going into the moving business. "Have Truck Will Haul" says their new business card and according to James, who has purchased the Chevy one ton box truck by using the monies he recently inherited, this idea will lead to a financial hauling empire. Not only should he have used the monies to pay on his student loans, Skip also thinks that James should have noticed the fact that the truck drinks oil like it is water. James is obvious secure in his belief that the only way to make real money is to spend the money he has and this time, he is going to spend it on his hauling stuff business idea.

Skip's girlfriend, Emily isn't thrilled with James or how he manages to lure her mid twenties boyfriend into one dream after another as Skip sort of drifts through life. Sure, he sells a security system now and then on commission, but he really isn't going anywhere and she believes he could do so much more. One possibility is that Skip could go work for her Dad's construction firm but Skip knows, for a number of reasons that all aren't under his control, why that idea would never work.

As it soon happens Emily leads the guys to their first client, Jackie Fuentes. A wealthy and sexy woman living behind the gates of a nearby exclusive community, she needs some stuff hauled away as quickly as possible and is willing to pay well. Her husband Rick has taken off with a far younger woman and she wants his things out of her house.

It should be a simple job for a few hours of work. It would have been a simple job if James, while backing up the truck at the storage facility, hadn't hit the building. If, the load which includes mail for Rick, hadn't shifted and spilled. If they hadn't noticed the fact that one of the envelopes was leaking. Or, if having noticed it was leaking, tossed it back with the rest of the mail and had never opened it.

But, they did notice and did decide to open the envelope. From there, things go from bad to worse at breakneck speed. James and Skip find themselves getting deeper in a mess with every move they make while agents of the CIA, Cubans bent on arms smuggling, and a host of other shady characters with multiple motivations, keep among other things, shooting at them. All that and Emily really needs to talk to James about the future of their relationship.

Part humor, part mystery, part thriller and definitely all suspenseful, this novel takes off and just keeps going barely letting the reader catch a breath on the way. Author Don Bruns brings all the characters vividly to life and yanks readers directly into the maelstrom that is their chaotic world. What could easily have gone the way of caricature and been the typical buddy style novel instead is a very good tension filled read packed with twists and turns guaranteed to keep readers guessing to the very end. The result is excellent stuff on every level and hopes that this just might be the start of a new series.

Kevin R. Tipple (copyright) 2007

Okay, thats hardly an original comment since others have said something similar, but so help me, this is the best way to get across the message as to whether this is your type of book or not. If you're looking for a gritty and plausible thriller, look somewhere else. But if you're looking for a very pleasant few hours in company with Skip, James, Em, and Angel, this is one for you and will lead you to reading the next two in the series. It's very tame compared to another Florida writer, Tim Dorsey, and will have a somewhat different fanbase. But if you enjoy reading about youthful adventurers hoping to get rich but stumble into delightfully dangerous situations, this is for you.

Don Bruns just wants to tell a good story, but he's also got a message underneath the twists and turns of his latest mystery, STUFF TO DIE FOR: why do people have all this stuff? It piles up and up and leads to no good, particularly in the case of James and Skip, two Florida guys, struggling to make it in dead-end jobs. They start a moving company with the plan of making it big, but on their first job, get more than they bargained for: a blood-stained envelope, the contents of which turn out to mean a great deal to Skip, the narrator. Soon, the two are up to their necks in a uniquely Floridian scheme, trying to save an old friend from the clutches of a large group of very angry Miami Cubans with revolution on their minds. The boys learn very quickly that easy money is rarely as advertised. A sharp, funny read with a surprisingly effective emotional undercurrent.

STUFF TO DIE FOR by Don Bruns puts the reins in the hands of a couple of Florida losers with grand ambitions and not much else. The two guys take on a simple moving job with a truck they've bought that's going to be the answer to all their prayers. In the process of wrecking the truck, they find something they shouldn't have found...a severed finger. Soon, money and promises are flying around, buildings are blown up, people are shooting at them, and the two are embroiled in intrigue hotter than a Miami afternoon. The book for anyone who's been tempted by the "easy score."

A couple of beer-guzzling, 24-year-old ne'er-do-wells, James and Skip, become embroiled in a deadly situation. James, a short order cook, inherits some money and buys a box truck. With Skip, a salesman of security systems who hardly ever makes a sale, they go into the hauling business. Their first job gets them into all kinds of trouble, and they have to run fast to keep ahead of the perpetrators of a developing criminal plot.

While unloading their first cargo, they find a bloody finger and a ransom note. As a result, they become targeted by the criminals who fear the boys have learned details of the plot. And the chase goes on and on. The main characters are hardly believable and the story is a mish-mash. James and Skip can hardly get anything right.

Skip has a sometime girlfriend who turned down employment offers of $150,000 a year to work for her father. She is supposed to be bright, but what's to account for her relationship with a dead-ender? James has visions of grandeur, remembering his father who was a perpetual failure. The story takes place in Miami and environs, where we find a cast of Cubans, CIA agents and a mysterious "Angel." Enough already.

2 long time friends with no direction in life get inadvertently caught in a political conspiracy. I enjoyed this book. It is light reading but you end up liking these characters.

The reader is prepared for this humorous-to-hilarious book by the opening paragraph of Chapter 1:

(Quote)

Believe me, when James first suggested we start a hauling business, I would have said no way in hell if I'd known we'd be hauling a human body part. And then to be accused of kidnapping and murder? But I've only got myself to blame. I've known from the start that James Lessor could get into more trouble than any ten people. I just keep forgetting that he's always dragging me in with him.

(End Quote)

The narrator is Skip Moore. He and James Lessor, best friends since third grade, have a yin-yang relationship.

Women: James is a babe magnet - cute, sexy, bold. Skip is 24 going on 16 when it comes to relationships. He muses: "I read one time that if you can get a girl to laugh, you can get her into bed. I'm always afraid that they'll laugh while we're in bed."

Work: James hates his boring job as a cook at the Cap'n Crab but he's full of schemes for something to make them rich, fat and happy. Skip, who dreams small, drudges through his nondescript job trying to sell security systems in a low-rent neighborhood.

When James unexpectedly inherits $12,000 he buys a Chevy one-ton box truck and tells Skip, "It's time to break out. Skip Moore and James Lessor, entrepreneurs. Moore and Lessor, or Lessor and Moore. Have truck, will haul."

Enter Em, Skip's well-heeled, occasional girl friend. Em has just the job to get them started. She knows Jackie Fuentes, a wealthy woman whose cheating husband has moved in with his mistress. Jackie wants his belongings hauled away. James quotes her an extravagant fee for hauling the stuff to a storage shed, and the entrepreneurs are off and running, in a manner of speaking.

The stuff they're hauling includes a month's worth of the husband's mail. When Skip drops some of it, a large envelope pops open, revealing a severed finger. Worse, the finger wears a class ring from the same high school Skip and James attended. Even worse, the ring is dated the year they graduated. Obviously the finger belonged to somebody they knew, but who?

The finger should be a tip off that the wronged wife isn't paranoid when she thinks her husband is involved with international terrorists. The budding entrepreneurs decide to deliver the husband's mail anyway. Bad move. They bumble into a political conspiracy and get a taste of the dark side of real life.

One of the interesting side characters is Angel, a seemingly whacked-out Bahamian who hangs out at the Gas and Grocery and keeps up to date on what Skip and James are doing. He walks out of the shadows at times when they can really use an "angel." What's in it for Angel? Maybe the adrenaline rush. We can only guess.

STUFF TO DIE FOR is the first of a series.There's plenty to keep a reader entertained, and more than enough to carry on into a series. Others in the series are STUFF DREAMS ARE MADE OF (2008); STUFF TO SPY FOR (2009); DON'T SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF (2010); and TOO MUCH STUFF (2011).

This comedic mystery is a fun read for those who love characters who end up detectives in spite of themselves.

James and Skip have been best frinds since the third grade. Even if James always dragged Skip into dubious schemes which likely-as-not got the two of them into trouble. Now in their mid-twenties, James is even more driven to start a business and to become a sucess, to accomplish what his father was never able to do. In his latest venture, James has purchased a used box truck so that he and Skip can haul "stuff" for people, when James isn't working at the restaurant and Skip isn't trying to sell security systems. Emily, Skip's girlfriend, gets them their first job and things look promising. Until they find that a letter in the "stuff" they are hauling is oozing, and open it, only to discover a severed finger. And then the fun begins.

Although the mystery is solid and well-written grammatically, the main characters are bumbling and get themselves in deeper with each move they make. The story is more about their friendship, with the mystery as the stage to highlight their characters. Good mind candy, but may not satisfy the true mystery afficionado.