Review: One False Move

Alex Kava is the national bestseller who has lead us into the depths of the criminal mind through FBI Special Agent, Maggie O’Dell. And while that is a scary place to be, we wait (im)patiently for her next book so that we may devour it, too.

Ms. Kava’s next book is “One False Move”, due out August 2004. This penning is a stand alone work, a step aside from her Maggie O’Dell series. But, Maggie O’Dell fans, do not be dismayed or deterred, this story is not to be missed!

“One False Move” introduces us to Jared Barnett. He is just being released from prison on a technicality, where he was serving a life sentence for murder. Now he wants to score the “big hit” with a bank robbery, but he needs help. He begins calling in favors from his younger sister, Melanie Sparks. She has lead of life of petty crime with her 17 year old son, Charlie. She has begun to feel that he thinks it is all a big game, but as things heat up with Jared’s plan, she doesn’t have time to think anymore.

Jared’s “perfect” plan goes awry, and while Melanie waits in the get-away car, she hears shots in the bank, then immediately Jared and Charlie exit running empty handed to the car. They refuse to tell her what they had planned and what actually happened in the bank. Their run from law enforcement through eastern Nebraska is dramatic and exciting and so real you’ll feel exhausted after reading it.

“One False Move” should go directly on your “must read” list. It is does an amazing job of creating a story that you really want to finish. And you want to know what happens to the characters, but you don’t have a lot of sympathy for or even like some of the main ones. It is very intense and real, the descriptions putting you right into emotions and/or places.

I thoroughly enjoyed Ms. Kava’s “One False Move”. I believe that her fictional work of a bank-robbery/multiple murder tragedy clearly is sensitive to the similar local tragedies and the victims that have occurred in eastern Nebraska.

I won’t be the first reviewer to say your One False Move would be to miss this one!

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Sandi - RAM

Book Review: One False Move