Review: BABY SHARK (2006) by Robert Fate (Barry Ergang at Flash Bang Mysteries)

Review: BABY SHARK (2006) by Robert Fate (Barry Ergang at Flash Bang Mysteries)

Review: "Baby Shark’s Grass Widow Legacy" by Robert Fate

It is June 1961 as this sixth book in the series opens. Kristin Van Dijk, known to one and all as “Baby Shark,” has always pushed things to the edge. While never fully expressed, no matter the situation, she carries herself with an attitude that she does not care whether she lives or dies. Working with Fort Worth Private Investigator Otis Millett has not polished her rough edges though he and others have tried. Working for him has increased her skill set while also making violent situations ultimately involving the police a little smoother than they would have been otherwise. But, that may be about to change as this latest incident involving Baby Shark might be too much for all involved to ignore. Going solo has consequences.

While the gates of hell just received two more very worthy inductees, in the land of the living Baby Shark has a problem.  Five years of working with Otis is not going to make this go away. Even with her background there are limits and she has really done it this time. Otis isn’t the only one who thinks she needs a vacation to clear her head and get her mind straight. He is the only one around who could enforce her taking a break and he definitely wants her out of town for a bit.

Baby Shark hits the road intending to see some old friends and get back to what she used to do to make money--play pool. Her moniker is legendary and those who don’t know of her in smoky pool rooms and dives across the state of Texas are about to get a crash course in reality. The only problem with her plan is that she might find more trouble out on the road than if she had stayed home and worked cases.

The series that started with the powerful debut novel Baby Shark (reviewed here) just keeps getting better and better. Plenty of action, complicated characters, and powerful imagery fuel this high octane series in reads that don’t stop until the final words.  Baby Shark’s Grass Widow Legacy is another very good read in an excellent series featuring a character forged in fire and blood determined to dispense justice as she sees fit. In her world some folks need help and a lot of folks need killing and she intends to do both while running the table.

Baby Shark’s Grass Widow Legacy  

Robert Fate

http://www.robertfate.com

Self-Published

October 2013

ASIN: B00GCYQHMS

266 Pages

$3.99

Material was purchased last month to read/review thanks to a small credit in my Amazon Associates account.

Kevin R. Tipple ©2014
http://www.amazon.com/gp/prime/signup/videos?tag= kevscor-20

Review: "Baby Shark’s Showdown at Chigger Flats" by Robert Fate

It is May 1960 in Fort Worth, Texas as this fifth book in the series begins. It is a calm quiet morning as Baby Shark, Kristin Van Dijk, brings around the old car she and her private investigator partner, Otis Millett, are going to use for a stakeout later in the day. Everything is peaceful until the shooting starts. 

When the shooting stops Baby Shark is wounded, cars are smashed and destroyed in the street with the wreckage everywhere, and bad dead guys litter the area. Fort Worth police respond in force and before long Baby Shark is getting treated and all involved know who is responsible. The manhunt is on and Otis and Baby Shark take precautions as they expect another ambush attempt.

That is not to say everything is under control. Far from it. In a violence filled tale that runs from Fort Worth to Chigger Flats in far West Texas near Fort Stockton, Baby Shark and some friends picked up along the way unleash a wave of violence on the bad guys equal to what was dealt to them. Fast paced and intense, this novel released by the author is vintage vengeance all the way through.

While the almost twenty-five year old Baby Shark occasionally pauses a moment or two to consider her past (fully covered in preceding books) as well as her future, the primary focus is on the current threat and ending those involved who would hurt her and Otis. To do that she spares no prisoners and gives better than she gets in this violence filled adrenalin ride for justice. Over five books Baby Shark has proven again and again you can’t rationalize with evil--you have to treat it for what it is and kill it.

Currently Baby Shark’s Showdown at Chigger Flats is only available as an e-book. If you have not read this series, I strongly suggest that you begin at the beginning with Baby Shark and work your way forward.

Baby Shark’s Showdown at Chigger Flats

Robert Fate

http://www.robertfate.com

July 17, 2012

E-book (estimated print length 256 pages)

$3.99

Material supplied by the author prior to publication.

Kevin R. Tipple ©2012

Robert Fate and a new Baby Shark

I am a huge fan of this series and Robert Fate has granted me permission to post his message which went out earlier this evening…..

Hello –

For Baby Shark fans looking forward to the release of book five in the series––there is a FREE Kindle advance sampler, The Road to Chigger Flats, available Saturday, July 7 at http://tinyurl.com/78tduhm

The Road to Chigger Flats is Free for five days––from July 7 through July 11.

In The Road to Chigger Flats, I provide a sneak preview of the soon-to-be-released Baby Shark’s Showdown at Chigger Flats: a peek at the first couple of chapters, and insight into the romantic future of Kristin Van Dijk. I predict you will enjoy this bonus read.

For those who do not own a Kindle––there is a simple way to download and read Kindle books on PC and MAC. Go to  www.robertfate.com  and learn how you can obtain Kindle books without owning a Kindle device. It’s easy to do.

The advance sampler is available now and after July 11 for .99, but please download it on one of the five free days from July 7 through July 11.

Best regards, Robert Fate
Author of the Baby Shark series

FFB DUAL REVIEW---"BABY SHARK" by Robert Fate

Recently BABY SHARK was offered as a free read via Kindle. Having liked the book (and the series) very much I suggested to Barry that he should pick it up and take a look. He did and decided he would review it. Hence, for the first time ever for Friday’s Forgotten Books hosted by Patti Abbott, both Barry and I are reviewing the same book on the same day. Barry’s new review of BABY SHARK is followed by my review originally written a number of years ago when I had all my hair, less weight, and could walk like a normal person….

BABY SHARK (2006) by Robert Fate

Reviewed by Barry Ergang

In 1952, accustomed to accompanying her pool shark father from one Texas poolroom to another where he earns money hustling suckers, seventeen-year-old Kristin Van Dijk doesn't experience violence as a way of life. Not, at least, until a fateful night in Henry Chin's poolroom when a member of the Lost Demons outlaw motorcycle gang shows up wanting revenge for having been hustled by her father. Violence erupts, resulting in multiple deaths that include those of Kristin's father, Henry's son, and one of the biker gang. Kristin is repeatedly raped and beaten by the bikers. When she recovers, having sustained some permanent damage and realizing the police aren't taking the incident seriously, she is determined to hunt down the men responsible for the deaths and her condition. Henry Chin is equally determined.

Kristin gets help from several different experts who put her through a rigorous course of training until she becomes proficient at hand-to-hand combat, the use of firearms, and at shooting pool. Henry hires private detective Otis Millett to locate their quarry, and then he and Kristin go after them. Sometimes Kristin goes alone. Along the way she learns that  people are not always the seemingly respectable folks they present themselves as. 

I read Baby Shark because a considerable number of people at a web group I belong to, one of whom is a close friend, have raved about it.  I enjoyed the book for what it is, a fast-paced, crisply told revenge/coming-of-age tale whose principal characters are decently fleshed-out (though most of the others are just names on the page). But I frankly don't understand the raves. There's nothing startlingly original about the premise, the violence that's vividly depicted, or the characters. Permit me—or forgive me for using—movie references: after being raped and assaulted by "The Wild One," a young woman transforms herself into  "The Karate Kid" and "The Hustler" to "Kill Bill."  

Will I read any of the sequels? Probably, if only to see in what direction the author takes his main characters, and to see how—and if—he develops them further. Mostly, however, Baby Shark hits me the way Mickey Spillane's novels do: as ephemeral mind-candy.

I can't address the paperback edition, but the Kindle edition could use a good proofreader to correct a significant number of punctuation errors.

Barry Ergang ©2012

Barry Ergang has books from his personal collection for sale at http://www.barryergangbooksforsale.yolasite.com/ He'll contribute 20% of the purchase price of the books to our fund, so please have a look at his lists, which have recently been added to. Some of his written work is available in e-book formats at Amazon.com (http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B005GXMF86) and at Smashwords (http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/cassidy20)

Its October, 1952 as this often violent crime novel opens in Henry Chin's Poolroom situated in West Texas. Seventeen year old Kristin "Baby" Van Dijk is there with her father, a pool hustler. With her mom dead and her aunt living up in Oklahoma, it's pretty much her, her dad, and her dad's Coupe de Ville as they travel Texas with her dad playing pool for money and reading books for fun. That is until members of the "Lost Demons" motorcycle gang walk in.

When it's over, her dad is dead, Henry Chin's son is dead, a couple gang members are dead, and Kristin has been raped repeatedly and brutally beaten. Her jaw is broken, teeth are missing, ribs are cracked, her nose is broken and the list keeps going on and on. She was lucky she lived through it and waking up in the hospital in Abilene makes her almost wish she hadn't. Then she meets Detective Hansard and it is pretty much clear that the case is going to go nowhere. As Henry puts it, "No police justice. Henry knows more ways one skin cat." (Page 20)

Author Robert Fate launches the reader into a revenge tale that is so much more than simple revenge. Kristin who rehabs and follows her dad's career path as a pool hustler quickly earning the name "Baby Shark" is not a stereotypical vigilante. Yes, there are elements of that sort of thing in her character, but as he does with all the characters in this fast moving novel, author Robert Fate shows the other side of her. Revenge, retaliation, payback, call it what you will, it has consequences often in unexpected ways and he grippingly details that side of it for the reader.

In a torturous and violence filled path that goes back and forth across West Texas and reaches into Forth Worth and Dallas, author Robert Fate weaves a complex trail of not only revenge, but duplicity and mystery. While the opening may be cut and dried between the black hats and the white hats, it isn't long before nothing is that simple. The result is a powerful, often violent novel that does actually live up to the media hype.

Kevin R. Tipple © 2007, 2012

This is a violent and very good book. I highly recommend this and am very happy to pass on a message I received today from author Robert Fate.


Today is the day to spread the word. Today thru the 22nd Baby Shark by Robert Fate is free on Kindle. Thanks for telling your friends on Facebook and tweeting this:

#Free TODAY for #Kindle! BABY SHARK, first in the kick-ass noir series with a strong female protag. http://tinyurl.com/freebabyshark  #amreading #mystery

Just trying to capture new readers and build some heat for the summer 2012 release of Baby Shark’s Showdown at Chigger Flats, book five in the Baby Shark series. And, Kill the Gigolo, a contemporary standalone with a male protagonist and a femme fatale that is one dangerous piece of work.

Thanks and happy reading,

Robert Fate
www.robertfate.com

Friday's Forgotten Books---"Baby Shark" by Robert Fate

My selection this week for the Friday's Forgotten Books Segment created by and primarily hosted by the wonderful Patti Abbott is not really a forgotten book. But, much like Reed Farrel Coleman, Robert Fate deserves far more recognition than he gets. This book kicked off the series and it has been a wild and hard ride. The book and the series is well worth your time and your hard earned money. This is a hard edged deal so violence on the page is common. If that bothers you, Baby Shark is not for you.




Its October, 1952 as this often violent crime novel opens in Henry Chin's Poolroom situated in West Texas. Seventeen year old Kristin "Baby" Van Dijk is there with her father, a pool hustler. With her mom dead and her aunt living up in Oklahoma, it's pretty much her, her dad, and her dad's Coupe de Ville as they travel Texas with her dad playing pool for money and reading books for fun. That is until members of the "Lost Demons" motorcycle gang walk in.

When it's over, her dad is dead, Henry Chin's son is dead, a couple gang members are dead, and Kristin has been raped repeatedly and brutally beaten. Her jaw is broken, teeth are missing, ribs are cracked, her nose is broken and the list keeps going on and on. She was lucky she lived through it and waking up in the hospital in Abilene makes her almost wish she hadn't. Then she meets Detective Hansard and it is pretty much clear that the case is going to go nowhere. As Henry puts it, "No police justice. Henry knows more ways one skin cat." (Page 20)

Author Robert Fate launches the reader into a revenge tale that is so much more than simple revenge. Kristin who rehabs and follows her dad's career path as a pool hustler quickly earning the name "Baby Shark" is not a stereotypical vigilante. Yes, there are elements of that sort of thing in her character, but as he does with all the characters in this fast moving novel, author Robert Fate shows the other side of her. Revenge, retaliation, payback, call it what you will, it has consequences often in unexpected ways and he grippingly details that side of it for the reader.

In a torturous and violence filled path that goes back and forth across West Texas and reaches into Forth Worth and Dallas, author Robert Fate weaves a complex trail of not only revenge, but duplicity and mystery in Baby Shark. While the opening may be cut and dried between the black hats and the white hats, it isn't long before nothing is that simple. The result is a powerful, often violent novel that does actually live up to the media hype.


Baby Shark
By Robert Fate
Capital Crime Press
http://www.capitalcrimepress.com
2006
ISBN # 0-9776276-9-1
Large Trade Paperback
270 Pages



Kevin R. Tipple © 2007, 2011