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Criminal Karma (Robert Rivers #2)
With Criminal Paradise, his gritty, satirical take on the criminal underworld and the society it preys on, Steven M. Thomas earned comparison to such masters as Elmore Leonard and Carl Hiaasen. Now Thomas has devised a new adventure for his charismatic hero, the small-time crook Robert Rivers, who has dreams of making the big score and the brains to pull it off–if only his...more
Hardcover, 272 pages
Published
July 28th 2009
by Ballantine Books
(first published July 15th 2009)
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“Criminal Karma,” the second novel in Steven M. Thomas’s Robert Rivers crime fiction series, is a real winner. In his first outing, “Criminal Paradise” (2008), Thomas introduced the charming felon Robert “Rob” Rivers and his scruffy sidekick, Reggie England, in a hard hitting Orange County crime saga with a lot of humor and some unforgettable scenes that got the book nominated as best first novel by the International Thriller Writers. In the sequel, the action moves up the coast from Newport Bea...more
I really liked this book. I like detective stories and that is sort of what this, but it is more interesting because the main character, Robert Rivers, is a criminal like the title says. But he still solves mysteries and helps people while he is doing his crimes. The book starts with Rob and his derelict partner Reggie, who is kind of a lowlife but funny, trying to steal a diamond necklace in Palm Springs. They fail on the first try and then go back to Venice Beach where they and the rich lady w...more
It is January 1996 and Robert “Rob” Rivers and his partner Reggie England are following a rich lady out to Palm Springs at the height of the winter season to steal a diamond necklace from her. Within a few fast-paced chapters, Rivers has run up against a homicidal moron named Jimmy Z who manages to throw a wrench in the gears of his careful plan. Rivers and England get away from the scene of the messed up robbery in the desert but find more trouble waiting back in Venice Beach where they and the...more
Richard Lollar
rated it
Recommends it for:
Anyone who likes to figure out mysteries, likes caper stories, likes to read about California.
I have another author to follow.
Our hero is a burglar, thief, stick-up man who has a moral code and is very into yoga.
Robert Rivers is a man of many parts which he calls on to complete the theft of a beautiful pink diamond necklace with matching earrings.
His escapades from the beach at Santa Monica to the desert near Palm Springs gives you a travelogue worth reading. Fighting true evil with just a little larceny is an interesting viewpoint. His descriptions of...more
Our hero is a burglar, thief, stick-up man who has a moral code and is very into yoga.
Robert Rivers is a man of many parts which he calls on to complete the theft of a beautiful pink diamond necklace with matching earrings.
His escapades from the beach at Santa Monica to the desert near Palm Springs gives you a travelogue worth reading. Fighting true evil with just a little larceny is an interesting viewpoint. His descriptions of...more
Thomas’s second novel is an advance on his first thriller, “Criminal Paradise.” In this book, which takes place in Venice Beach, you get the same humorous dialogue, vivid characters, and exciting action as the first, but you also get more heart and a better story in a certain sense. Rob Rivers, the criminal narrator shows new sides of himself and ends up a sort of hero, helping the very woman that he is setting out to rob. The scenery and sense of Southern California is very strong and there is ...more
What is it that attracts us to the "other" side, the rooting for the thief, the hit man, the bad guy. I'm really not sure, but that's what happens in this fun novel of a thief chasing after an especially valuable necklace. Despite the violence (and make no mistake, people get killed and thumped, even if they are "badder" than the protagonist) the book has a fairy tale quality to it with the obligatory happy ending: the good-bad-guy gets the girl and the money and lives happi...more
This is a sequel that is even better than the first in this series. The author has a remarkable gift for description of the people and surroundings, which more than offsets his somewhat mundane characters. This time the story takes place in Venice Beach, and the author does a great job bringing the reader into the milieu. I enjoyed the book and look forward to the next in the series starring this unique antihero.
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Steven M. Thomas is the award-winning author of Criminal Paradise and many short stories, essays, and poems that have been published in more than fifty literary and small-press magazines in the United States and England. Until recently, he served as editor of OC Metro, a high-circulation magazine based in Orange County, California, where he lives.
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