Book Review: Best Served Cold

First there was a high profile up and coming NASCAR driver. Shot and killed at close range.

Now the victim is an up and coming high profile pro basketball star.

Private detective Tony Razzolito (a.k.a. The Razzman) isn’t concerned about the latest death until his friend, Captain Rita O’Connor of homicide, asks him to help on the case.

The only problem for Tony is he has to work with his nemesis Detective John Cahill.

Once again, Joe Congel delivers a well wrought whodunit that kept me guessing all the way to the surprise ending.

I’ve read all of the Tony Razzolito mysteries. And they just keep getting better and better. A good thing getting better is a very good thing.

What I like best about Congel’s stories are his characters. They have personality. They are three dimensional. They pop off the page because they are real people.

Characters make fiction sing. We remember memorable characters. Rarely do we remember a plot.

As Ray Bradbury advised writers: create your characters, let them do their thing, and there’s your story.

And Joe Congel lets his characters do their thing. In doing so, a story is created that carries us along from beginning to end. We are right there living the story along with the characters. That’s the work of a master storyteller. And Congel is a master.

While Best Served Cold is laced with loads of humor, the story itself is dark. It is a vengeance tale reminiscent of Jacobean theater. Bloody and unrelenting. It’s a good thing the humor is there – it relieves the darkness of the mystery.

Best Served Cold is the fourth book in The Razzman Mystery Crime files. I’m already waiting for number five.

Pick up your copy of Best Served Cold on Amazon.

And if you haven’t read the other Razzman mysteries, you can find them on Amazon, too.

Comments are always welcome! And until next time, happy reading!

CW Hawes is a playwright; award-winning poet; and a fictioneer, with a bestselling novel. He’s also an armchair philosopher, political theorist, social commentator, and traveler. He loves a good cup of tea and agrees that everything’s better with pizza.