SHOOT 'EM UP

A scrappy Chicago cop seeks her own personal justice when her brother is shot.

Coming from a family of five older brothers is tough enough, but Maisie McGrane’s family is all Irish cops and lawyers in the tough streets of Chicago. Not only do they give her a hard time, but they’re also determined to keep her safe, which could be worse. One example? Maisie’s Da got her kicked out of the police academy, which should have crushed her dreams of being a cop like him. Not a girl to let something like that keep her down, Maisie talked her way into working deep undercover (she can't even tell her family) as the beard of mob boss Stannislav Renko (Choked Up, 2015). Now that Renko’s been smuggled to Serbia by Maisie’s actual boyfriend, Hank Bannon, Maisie’s on to her next assignment, as soon as she recovers from the injuries of her first. Though Maisie should be focusing on developing her latest cover, she’s distracted by the shooting of her brother, Cash. Vowing to get justice for him, she delves further into the convoluted drug scheme run by Violetta Veteratti. Is Maisie in over her head? She wishes she had Hank’s calm voice to talk her through what’s happening—readers could probably use an outside voice to clarify the narrative too—but Hank’s gone AWOL. Instead, Maisie’s got to deal with fast-talking Lee Sharpe, a colleague determined to insert himself into her latest assignment, even though his motivation is more about being near Maisie than anything else.

Without more information about the book's context, the heroine’s full personality doesn’t shine; readers will have to focus more than they should on trying to piece together her back story.