Sugar Pop Moon: A Jersey Leo Novel
Jersey Leo is a mixed-race albino working as a bartender in a Hell’s Kitchen speakeasy. His father, a former boxing champion, doesn’t approve of his son working for gangsters, and Jersey doesn’t know who his mother was. Jersey gets a great deal on some moonshine called Sugar Pop Moon, but when he serves the first pour, he realizes he’s been taken in a bait-and-switch operation. His boss is out of town, giving Jersey a couple of days to get the money back and replace the shine or he’s a dead man. He chases the con artist to Philadelphia, where a crazed man with a hatchet tries to kill him. Jersey turns to his father for help and, in the process, learns about his mother and her family. This is a hard-boiled, Prohibition-era novel and Jersey Leo is a well-developed, engaging character. The story moves fast, the violence is appropriate to the times, and there are laugh-out-loud moments amid the mayhem. Sure to appeal to fans of Mickey Spillane, Raymond Chandler, and, more currently, Robert Fate’s edgy Baby Shark series. --Stacy Alesi