Barbara’s rating: 5 of 5 stars

Series: Fox and O’Hare #7
Publication Date: 3/23/21
Number of Pages: 320

This is an exciting, on-the-edge-of-your-seat, thrilling, can’t-put-it-down read. It was so engrossing I read it through in one sitting – boy did I pay for that the next day – but it was worth it! Steve Hamilton is the third co-author in this series, so I wondered how that was going to work. I definitely enjoyed the first five stories when Lee Goldberg was the co-author. I wasn’t as thrilled with the sixth one co-authored by Peter Evanovich, but this one with Steve Hamilton is good. There are definitely changes in Nick’s character though – they are subtle, but they are there. Nick isn’t as smooth and polished (think Remington Steele or Neil Caffrey from White Collar Crime) as he was in the beginning. Kate, however, is just as tough-as-nails as she ever was.

Kate and Nick are working with Interpol to track down an organization called The Brotherhood. In order to expand their organization and fund their efforts to bring a Fourth Reich to power, the Brotherhood wants to find billions of dollars’ worth of gold bullion that was buried by the Nazis just before WWII ended. In the opening scenes, Interpol knows someone is going to rob the Vatican and they assume the target is a valuable ring from the Pope’s collection. They are all set – all of the police organizations are in place – security is so tight that a flea couldn’t get through. Until – someone does get through. He definitely has world-class skills and when Nick almost catches him, he is absolutely shocked at the thief’s identity.

As they investigate and learn more and more, their ‘team’ grows to include both Kate and Nick’s fathers along with a mild-mannered professor and a former British SAS member. While they race around the countries that made up the former Axis countries, the Brotherhood is right on their heels. We travel all across those countries and back again looking for maps that contain clues to the location of the treasure. The maps are hidden in some of the most gosh-awful places – even polar bear habitats – and they contain cryptic and obscure clues. Our intrepid crew performs some death-defying stunts before they come to the end of the case. There are lots of twists and turns before the bad guys get their comeuppance and the whole thing will keep you holding your breath.

I’ll also point out that the blurb is misleading in regards to Nick and Kate’s fathers. Nick’s father didn’t teach him everything he knows – at least not how to be a world-class thief and con man. I’m not sure his father even knew about his career as a criminal. Nick’s father had done some ‘off the books’ work for the CIA and sort of lead a double life in that respect. When Nick learned of it, he and his father basically became estranged. Nick and his father share a great many talents – but they were mostly on different sides of the law. Kate and her father don’t disagree about everything. He does his best to protect her as any father would, but he listens to her, he helps her, and they collaborate on most things.

I thoroughly enjoyed this read and I hope you will as well. If you haven’t read the first five books in the series, I highly recommend those to you.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an Advanced Reader Copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.