Pale Horses

Jade de Jong #4

by Jassy Mackenzie

Book 4 in the PI Jade de Jong thriller series set in South Africa

Johannesburg, South At first, the case appears to be one of simple misadventure. Sonet Meintjies, a base jumper, falls to her death while attempting to parachute off a newly built sixty-five-story skyscraper. But Sonet’s jumping partner insists this was no accident, and he hires private investigator Jade de Jong to uncover the truth.

Jade discovers Sonet worked for a charity that helped impoverished communities become self-supporting farming units. When Jade travels out to the community farm in Limpopo, she finds it not just abandoned but razed to the ground. Digging deeper for answers about where the residents went, Jade learns about a fatal but unidentified disease that swept through the entire community. A deadly harvest has been gathered, and the person who knows the real truth about it has been forced to become collateral in its trade.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Thriller, Suspense, Africa, South Africa, Mystery Thriller

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Jassy Mackenzie lives in Johannesburg, South Africa, and was inspired to write her first thriller, Random Violence, after being carjacked at gunpoint in her driveway.

She is the author of the Jade de Jong thriller series, featuring a feisty female PI who prefers to operate outside the law, and has also written four erotic romances.

Jassy loves horse riding, cycling, traveling, cooking and reading.

Reviews

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

In this 4th book in the 'Jade de Jong' series, the private investigator looks into what, at first, seems to be an accidental death. The book can be read as a standalone.

*****

Private detective Jade de Jong - who I think of as a sort of female Jack Reacher - lives and works in Johannesburg, South Africa.



Jade, who recently 'disappeared' someone, is planning to take a break from work when she's approached by Victor Theron, a wealthy trader in commodities futures. Victor tells Jade that he and his girlfriend Sonet Meintjies enjoyed base jumping (parachuting off tall structures), and recently leapt from a sixty-eight story skyscraper called Sandton Views.



Victor jumped first, and when Sonet followed, her parachute didn't open and she was killed. Victor - who packed the defective chute - fears he'll be accused of murder, and asks Jade to investigate.



Jade doesn't want to take the case, but after she sees suspicious footprints on the rooftop of Sandton Views, agrees to look into the matter.



Jade learns that Sonet Meintjies worked for an organization that helps native South African tribes reclaim their land from white owners.....and then farm it with modern methods.



One homestead Sonet was assisting had been doing very well, and even had a windmill-powered granary. The tribe had sown newly developed disease-resistant seeds, and expected to show a profit by the second year. Instead, the farm failed and the tribe disappeared.



Jade visits the farm, which is several hours drive from Johannesburg. There she discovers something that's apparently a dire threat to someone. An attempt is made to involve Jade in a fatal car accident, and when that fails, hired killers pursue her.

Jade is a clever woman, though, and the goons underestimate her every time. (This is a gal you DON'T want to get on the wrong side of. 😡)



The thugs also target a man Jade has interviewed as well as members of dead Sonet's family.....and it's clear the stakes are very high. The reason is unveiled as the story unfolds, and it's a DOOZY! I can't say more because of spoilers.



Meanwhile, in a tangential story line, a single mother is forced to become the driver for a hired assassin. When the woman is on the job, she tools around in a Mercedes and dresses fashionably, so police will think she and the killer are a wealthy married couple.



The woman wants to run away, but her employer - who engaged the killer - monitors every move she makes, and she fears for herself and her little boy.

These two story lines - Jade's case and the roaming assassin - merge as the book approaches it's climax.

Over the course of the series, Jade has had an on-off relationship with married Police Superintendent David Patel.



David was estranged from his wife when he and Jade first connected, but circumstances forced him to return to his spouse. David and Jade still work together professionally, and - in this book - David helps Jade with her case and Jade helps David investigate anonymous letters he's been receiving. The ex-lovers still yearn for one another, and - as things shake out - there may be hope for them yet. 😍

This is an exciting story in an interesting setting. I listened to the audiobook, narrated by Justine Eyre, who does a great job with the characters' names and accents. Fans of thrillers would probably enjoy the book.

You can follow my reviews at https://reviewsbybarbsaffer.blogspot....

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jade de Jong reminded me of a dude. Let me just put that out there right now, so you’re not left wondering later, and just in case you don’t like chicks that act like dudes. Me, I have no strong reservations on the matter, and I’m all for equal opportunity. In fact, I’d even go so far as to say that strong women…and men are interesting to me. Because it’s not easy to perfect the bad*ss lassiez faire attitude with a devil may care grin plastered on your face.

But Jade pulls it off. And she does it with a smoking body and smoking attitude. She’s not afraid of anyone, and she’s certainly not afraid to throw herself in the line of fire. David Patel is the yin to her yang, and it works. It really, really does.

The South African setting with the swan dive courtesy of Sonet Meintjies off the sixty-five story Sandton skyscraper was a new twist to me in the eventful death arena, and I must say I rather enjoyed the unique approach, not necessarily the demise of said individual.

I enjoyed the characters, the storyline, and the mystery fulfilled my attention, but I didn’t feel like I was a stock car on the last lap of the track executing a mad dash to the checkered flag. Instead, I’d call it heightened curiosity without ever becoming completely immersed in PALE HORSES. But if unique deaths and unique settings are your thing, you’ll find plenty of both here.

I received this book for free through Goodreads First Reads.

Cross-posted at Robert's Reads

[Skip · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this series gets better with every book, and would give this a 4.5 stars, if possible. Jade de Jong is hired by a futures trader to investigate the death of a base jumper, whose parachute fails during a jump of the tallest building in Sandton, Johannesburg. Jade finds that she worked for a not-for-profit enterprise, helping indigent natives reclaim lands taken away from them. One of those projects has completely disappeared, piquing Jade's interest. When the jumper's family starts dying or disappearing, Jade finds help from her ex-lover, Superintendent David Patel. Taut writing, good political commentary, and Jade is a strong and brave female protagonist, who delivers justice in her own unequivocal fashion.

[a · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pale Horses... 5 stars

What can I say about my love for this series?
I love the feisty, pigheaded, smart, sassy & extreme hot sauce lovin Jade De Jong.
This is book 4 in a series that just keeps getting better and better.
Each book is a wealth of information on something I found that I knew nothing About, South Africa!
I enjoy the language which trips around your mouth tying your tongue in knots and the names of some of the weird and wonderful foods like Boerewors, which is a sausage & Biltong, a type of cured meat.

My heart broke for Jade in the 3d book “The Fallen” after she had booked a scuba diving Holiday In Saint Lucia with her on again, off again married but separated boyfriend Chief Superintendent David Patel, hoping to rekindle some of the romance, when he drops the bomb of his "estranged" wife's pregnancy! Then along comes smart, cute Environmentalist Craig Niewoudt, who I thought for sure would catch Jade’s heart, that is until a brutally murdered dive instructors body is found and then with a cliffhanger ending that nearly gave me a heart attack when… oops! You’ll just have to read that book to find out what happened!

Alrighty then! “Pale Horses” the title of which took until p.212 to finally learn the meaning of. And it most definitely does fit the subject matter…
Jade is nursing her bruised heart when she gets what she thinks is a simple case about base jumper Sonet Meintjies, who’s chute didn't open in a jump, leaving her to die and the friend who jumped with her hires P.I. Jade to find answers as to exactly what happened.
What she discovers is a very large, wealthy & nasty company, who under
the guise of a charity that Sonet worked for is pretending to help a small community farm in Limpopo with disease resistant seeds. But when people on this farm start to die horribly and disappear along with their livestock, Jade goes after the bad guys with gun in hand.
What she finds out is that Sonet and her siblings had found damaging information against this company and then they too, start to die horribly and disappear...
Jade soon realizes she has stepped off into a huge and very ugly conspiracy of a potentially global crime.
This is another chilling, thrilling and all to real page turner that could be ripped straight from the headlines of any paper in any country in the world.
Jassy Mackenzie has done it once again, this book will keep you up into the wee hours turning pages & biting your nails!
I loved the Magdalena Eckhardt “bits” at the beginning and the end, they were wonderful!

I won this on goodreads for a fair and honest review

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the latest Jade de Jong novel, Mackenzie continues her informative description of life and crime in South Africa. Jade de Jong is hired by a wealthy trader to investigate a suspicious death of a close friend, Sonet Meintjies. During a base jump, Sonet died attempting to parachute from a skyscraper. Could there be more to this than a simple miscalculation or equipment failure? Jade begins digging deeper, which uncovers that Sonet had an extensive charity portfolio and worked closely with impoverished communities as they tried to rebuild their farming base. Jade goes to inquire, but finds one community whose name is all over Sonet portfolio completely razed to the ground for no good reason. Working at arm's length with Superintendent David Patel, Jade peels back the mystery and soon realises that there is a plethora of evil lurking under the surface, with unknowing Africans as blindsided victims. While still wrestling with her emotions for Patel and the news he delivered months earlier, Jade must forge ahead to save the community and Africa as a whole from the grip of a multi-national corporation bent on building their profit margin on the backs of farming collectives. Gripping in its telling and content, Mackenzie taps into the reader's curiosity to deliver a wonderful addition to the series.

While some have lauded Mackenzie for always delivering a new and more thrilling novel, I was not as impressed with the fourth instalment of the Jade de Jong series. There were moments of intrigue and wonderful sleuthing, but the narrative impetus and thrill factor seems to have dissipated as Mackenzie rests on her laurels a little, leaving Jade and Patel to fend for themselves. The subject matter appeared a little to intrigue, but not tear the reader away from their respective issues and push crop modification front and centre in their lives. The ideas were fresh and the approach ever-evolving, but I am not sure how I truly feel about the Jade de Jong story here, or the lack of personal development. It appears as though too much came out in the last novel and there is nothing on which to build in this novel.

Kudos, Madam Mackenzie for a good piece of writing. I would love to see another novel come into this series, if you have new and impressive ideas to share.

Like/hate the review? An ever-growing collection of others appears at:
http://pecheyponderings.wordpress.com/

[Jjudyfl · Rating 5 out of 5]

I won this book from Goodreads. YAY!
DO NOT MISS OUT on reading this book just because someone gave it the name PALE HORSES. It doesn't take place out West, or involve cowboys or have any similarity to All The Pretty Horses.
Why did a seasoned base jumper die in a fall/jump was what her jumping partner wanted to know ... and hired P.I. Jade de Jong to find out.
Set in South Africa allowed the story to have a fresh location and present normal yet unique characters..
When I get a new book I always read the first 2 pages of it & add it to the floor stack for later reading, but I was intrigued enough to continue..
'Power is owned by whoever controls a country's food sources' became an observation entered into the story and intensified the thrill & danger I was already sensing.
I like the book's pacing. It was a good, solid, thrilling read. Jassy Mackenzie is a terrifyingly skilled writer. I plan to read more of the Jade de Jong series.

[Cheryl · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was the first book that I have read by Jassy Mackenzie. I received it through Goodreads and it is an advance uncopyedited edition. It is one of her Jade De Jong series books.

Great book that started with Jade De Jong being hired by Victor Theron to investigate a fatal base jumping accident of his friend Sonet van Rensburg from a sixty five story skyscraper. What appears to be a very open and closed case turns into something altogether different and a scary thought provoking story line.

I loved Jassy's writing style and she kept my attention throughout the story. With her storytelling, I was able to picture the characters and African countryside.

I know that this won't be the last book I read by Jassy Mackenzie. She's got a new fan!

[Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

First Reads Review - Pale Horses by Jassy Mackenzie

When I won this through the First Reads program of GoodReads, I was rather chuffed that it would give me a chance to read a book by an author that isn't part of the male white American majority of authors that I tend to read. It is just easier, given the genres I read and the fact that I am male, to read those authors that are marketed directly to me, and I do like to diversify my interests and what I am exposed to.

Not that I believe that the author being female or South African effects the quality of her writing, but it is refreshing to read something from a perspective I am not used to. And it worked out great because this book is a fine read, full of action and intelligence, strong character work, and an engaging plot. It is exactly the thing that I like, and it only saddens me some that I probably would never have known it existed if not for the First Reads program. But onward with the review.

This novel, despite being the forth in the Jade de Jong series, is instantly approachable and intelligible. Though there are aspects of the story and the characters' lives that do pick up from earlier books, this novel does not require the reader to have any previous knowledge of the characters to get in and enjoy the story, the setting, or the plot. Everything is understandable, given in a way that we understand where the characters are and where they are going without losing us along the way. Further, it advances enough of these side stories to give the characters a sense of depth that would be difficult to accomplish otherwise. The plot lines are tight and rewarding, and don't seem tacked on or contrived.

As for the characters, Jade is a strong woman, independent and intelligent, able to navigate a very dangerous world with skill and resourcefulness. She is fun and flawed, but still very much the owner of her actions. At the beginning of the novel we find that she just murdered someone for money, an act that bothers her throughout much of the book. But her story is also one of coming to terms with the actions she takes, and ultimately she begins to evolve not towards a more lawful approach, but with the knowledge that sometimes one must go outside the law to do what's right.

This is a great point to arrive at, and something that I was almost bothered by. But I do like that the author did not make Jade punished for her "sins" or overly burdened by them. I think that because the character is female there is more an expectation that she will be more nurturing, and that she isn't, that she is more active and decisive, is great, is empowering. This is the sort of character there needs to be more of.

And the plot is solid and moving, quickly paced with plenty of action, car chases and shoot outs and a bit of sex thrown in for good measure, which is always nice. Really my only complaints stem from the fact that certain aspects of the story, and certain characters, seemed a little tired. The plot line with Jade's police love interest and his pregnant wife seemed like they were there largely for dramatic punch and I found myself rolling my eyes as that particular element unfolded.

That is a small enough complaint, though. Really, I did enjoy the book and the fun ride it took me on. There is some furious action and this was a book that one can finish in a day, that one can just let go into and come back out the other side satisfied and hungry for more. So really the author achieves everything that she seems to set out to do. The book is good, and I am glad that I got the chance to give it a read. As such, I give it an 8.25/10.

[David Caldwell · Rating 3 out of 5]

I won a copy on Goodreads Firstreads.

This was an advanced reader's copy and still needed a final proofreading.It was fairly rough which led to some confusing moments.Since it is also set in South Africa, there are also different terms (sometimes different spellings)or phrases(most are minor like hooters for car horns)with which to deal. Place names and names of people are very different to anything of which I am familiar.The customs and differences in classes can also differ greatly at times between South Africa and America.These factors are both good and bad for a reader like me.The differences make the locale an exotic setting that I will probably never get a chance to visit outside of a book.The bad is that mixed into an uncopyedited book, you can never be quite certain if it is a typo, just a different spelling, or something new to you.

This is the fourth Jade De Jong mystery.There are several references to previous material especially in the beginning of the book, but nothing that should throw a reader new to the series.Jade is hired to investigate what appears to be the tragic and accidental death of a base jumper named Sonet.Sonet's jumping partner,Chris Theron, does not believe it was an accident, but the most logical suspect would be himself.So Chris wants Jade to find out what really happened.Jade discovers that Sonet worked for a charity helping communities to develop self-supporting farms.As she digs deeper, she discovers everything isn't as simple as it sounds with the farms.With hired killers chasing Jade, she knows she has stumbled about something much more dangerous and that she will need to find the answers quickly before her time runs out.

The characters are interesting and for the most part likeable.I also enjoyed learning more about South Africa,which at times sounds fascinating and other times like a place from which to stay far away.The mystery is suspenseful and moves at a decent pace.There are several plot threads running throughout the book and all are tied up neatly by the novel's end.Usually this last thing is something that really pleases me.I hate loose threads in a book.But the problem is that the plot threads are tied up in such a way that they seem a little too pat.They feel like they could only happen in a story and not in real life.

This book should appeal to fans of the series(I am assuming it is repesentative of the series.)It will also appeal to someone who wants to add a little exoticness to the locales of their mysteries.

[Deb Ribak · Rating 4 out of 5]

I won this book on Goodreads Firstreads. This was an advanced reader's copy (ARC) and still needed a LOT of editing! It was difficult to read because of all the grammatical errors. Also, at the end of the book, the wrong character's name is used, which caused a lot of confusion. I've read other ARC books, but they have never been as challenging as this one. Once it's proofread, it will be much better.

I won't write a summary of the story, since so many others have already done that. I just want to explain what I liked about the book. Since the story is set in South Africa, it makes it much more interesting. There was a lot of South African history brought up throughout the story, which I found fascinating. There are also a lot of typically South African words and character names that are used. That make the story so much more authentic. This is the fourth Jade De Jong mystery and as a first-time reader of the series, I knew these characters had history that I was missing. The author does a good job of giving you enough information that you can still follow the story though, without insulting those who have read the previous books. One of the things that most impressed me was the way in which the author describes scenes and situations. She has such a way of writing, that you feel like you are actually there or can at least picture it very accurately in your mind. Her details are wonderful.

The story is interesting and holds your attention. The characters are likable and yet, very flawed. You want to read the next book in the series because so many things are left unsettled with the main characters - you know there's more to come. Overall, I would recommend the book - after it has been edited!

[Robert Davis · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received an Advance Uncopyedited Edition through goodreads. Taking into account that my copy was unedited, I'll refrain from criticizing the obvious areas in need of editing an instead focus on the main plot and style of the story.

This is my first exposure to writer Jassy Mackenzie and her Johannesburg PI Jade de Jong series. Coming in late to a series can be tricky, (this is #4 in the series) and there is a lot of backstory here concerning Jade's dark past and actions. But, I felt settled in with the characters and surroundings fairly smoothly. Jade has some serious demons from previous adventures, but she doesn't let them weigh her down too much. She is a girl who can take care of herself both physically and emotionally, the former being easier than the later.

The story is fluid and interesting, tightly woven and captivating. The character are all well conceived and flushed out. Some scenes get graphic, but not to the point of nausea, and they really convey the gruesomeness and inhuman aspects the characters involved. There is one point in the story when... Jade finds a tape recording with smoking gun evidence, and instead of giving it over to her cop/boyfriend (which any sane person would have done under the circumstances) she pockets it and keeps it a secret. I screamed, "NO! Why would she do that?!" (OK, I didn't scream, I'm too lade back for that, but I did give a hearty "harumph!" But, in the end, she made that seemingly poor and illogical decision pay off for her big time.

The most important question is, would I want to invest my valuable and limited reading time to another Jade de Jong mystery? Indeed, yes I would. I'd love to see where Jade ends up next.

[Marc Leroux · Rating 5 out of 5]

I won a copy of Pale Horses by Jassy Mackenzie, a pre-release Tpb ARC (Advance Uncopyedited Edition), through the Goodreads giveaway program. Thanks!
I've never heard of this series before, and this is one of the great things about the Goodreads program. I doubt that I would have picked it up otherwise. Now I'll look for some of the earlier works.
The book is a suspense/mystery/thriller that is set in South Africa, a country I've been to many times, although not for the past 15 years. It brought back a lot of great memories that I have of the country.
The story starts with a Private Investigator, Jade de Jong being hired by a man under suspicion of killing his girlfriend who died when her parachute failed to open while base jumping from the top of an office building. de Jong doesn't want to take the case, grudgingly does so on a recommendation from a former client. The investigation takes her into a ripped-from-the-headlines investigation of the control that mega-corporations have on the agriculture industry, and peripherally into how they are contributing to the death of the small farming concerns.
I found this to be a great read. I almost put it down after reading the prologue, but by the end of the first chapter I was hooked. The pace is fast, interesting subplots, a great heroine and a very interesting twist in the ending. The only unresolved question I had ended up being "Why was she hired in the first place?".
Good book, great read, informative back stories, good insight into the South African culture (complicated at the best of time)and an all round great thriller. Highly recommended.

[Rob Slaven · Rating 4 out of 5]

As usual, I received this book via a GoodReads giveaway and therefore paid nothing for it. Despite that very kind consideration by the publisher, I give my candid opinions below.

Placing this book in a tidy nutshell, this is a classic 'who-dun-it' set in South Africa. A woman is dead, ostensibly killed in a base jumping accident. The worried boyfriend has engaged the services of the esteemed Jade to find the real killer before the cops come along and pin it on him.

The setting adds somewhat to the novel as we get a small smattering of local color and culture one wouldn't expect in a more western-focused novel. Our author does a great job of misdirection and the ending is anything but the typical. I'm not a particularly regular reader of this genre but this veered off in a direction I didn't really expect at the outset. Mackenzie's rendering of character is vivid and her descriptions of violence or wonderfully graphic, though tasteful and used only when necessary.

The downside here is that at times her novel seems a bit preachy and struggles to make a political point. While I agree at least in part with her assertions, the tactic she uses is at times overly blunt-force.

On the whole, for fans of the suspense genre, this is a reasonably amusing series. The unique geography sets the book apart from most and the storyline doesn't fall into the usual predictable track. This is no Agatha Christie, but it's a fair start towards that standard.

[virany · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was so excited about winning my first First read that I forgot - I don't usually read mysteries, and I frown on starting a series in the middle. To me, that's a lot like picking the grilled cheese out of a grilled cheese sandwich. Then I remembered, I actually have de-cheesed my grilled cheese sandwiches, and come to think of it, I loved "G is for Gumshoe" before I learned the alphabet starts at A.

The story crawls at the start, either because I have no idea of the characters and their sordid backstories or because every mystery needs some time to wind up. Somewhere a third of the way in, though, I went from confused to very intrigued. Half way through, I was downright page-turning and spilling yogurt on myself while reading because I'm a horrible multitasker and all my attention was on the book.

I liked the character of Jade, though typical of hard boiled mysteries, there's not a lot of time devoted to her enjoying a beer and pondering life. Which is great. What I especially enjoyed was the sense of place -- the author has lived in South Africa since she was eight and sets Jade's story there. The plot expertly weaves the centuries-old conflicts over tribal lands into a modern setting of corporate conspiracy, medical ethics, and efficient cell phone texting. I'll be curious to check out those previous books in the series.

[Bonnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pale Horses is a Jade De Jong mystery set in South Africa. At first, the case for Jade appears simple-find out what happened to a base jumper who falls from a sixty-five story skyscraper to her death when her parachute malfunctioned. The man she was with insists it was not an accident and hires Jade to prove it. Jade discovers the dead woman worked for a charity that helped impoverished communities become self-supporting. When Jade travels to one of the communities in Limpopo, she finds it razed to the ground. When she tries to uncover where they went, she learns about a fatal disease that swept through the entire community. A company doing research on maize had engineered a product that caused fatal cancers to appear in the intestines of anything ingesting the corn. She also discovers a journalist probing the disappearance of the entire community has gone missing. A subplot follows a woman named Ntombi Khumalo, the only person in the community who didn't die and her job to keep her son alive, driving a car for a professional killer. The plot was fast-paced, the characters believable, the suspense thrilling. It was a great read.

[Lissa00 · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a Goodreads Firstreads Giveaway. This is the first book I have read in the Jade de Jong series and I really enjoyed it and will read the first three in the series. The book centers on Private Investigator Jade de Jong and her newest case involving genetically engineered crops in South Africa. The book was fast-paced and I didn't guess all of the criminal connections until the end. Jade is a strong and intelligent female character who definitely weighs every decision to ensure she is doing the right thing. I really enjoyed reading a book based in South Africa and there are a lot of political and social issues that are addressed througout. While I think that this book can be read without reading the first three, I do think that I might have been more connected to other characters in the book if I had followed the series in order. Overall, it was a good book and I am looking forward to starting the series from the beginning.

[Cj · Rating 2 out of 5]

I won a copy of this book as part of a GoodReads giveaway.


Hard to believe there were 300 copies sent out to winners.
The copy sent was unedited.


I want to be fair here, I only read two chapters. My husband noticed my frustrations with the book and said, "I'll read it." I felt the first chapter was completely unnecessary, because it didn't bring anything to the book. The book picked up on the second chapter. But, I still had difficulties reading it because of run on sentences. And improper usage of tense (past, present, future).

I didn't like the characters. I couldn't relate.
I disliked the emphasize on labels, brand names, and cliches.
The tone set was rather depressing.

I didn't find the book suspenseful or exciting.
Perhaps, my husband will feel differently?
If so, I will update (add his opinion) this review.

[Tuck · Rating 4 out of 5]

i think this is the 4th private eye mystery of jade de jong, south african bad ass PI and frustrated illicit lover of police detective david patel, unhappily married and not beyond breaking lots of rules for jadey to solve the case.
in this particular violent, blood soaked, history soaked, sex soaked triple mystery, you will NOT believe what killed off a whole village of black farmers who got their old farmlands back from the mean old Boers after about 100 years of living on their dusty poor ass reservation.
it is an intriguing and so far-out idea that hell, it just could be possible.
we better hope not though.

[Carole Anderson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a Goodreads win for me and I thoroughly enjoyed the book. I will read more of these series. I was totally engrossed in the book and completely surprised by the ending - that does it for me! The setting was in Africa and that was different, but interesting for me. I would highly recommend this book!

[Kathryn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jassy Mackenzie is remarkable. I couldn't put it down. Kindness, fear all in the same story. Loved it!

[Lulu]

I won this book from the first reads giveaways and I am so excited to read it. Thanks.

[Lynne]

I won this book for free through Goodreads First Reads. Looking forward to reading it. Thank you.

[Trish · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just loved this fourth in a series featuring Jade de Jong, private investigator. We are never really told what she looks like at all except for a description by an older romance writer who sees Jade in a restaurant and makes up a backstory to fit:

"Her features...[were] attractive and strong and without a trace of make-up. But...what hist her powerfully was the incredible tiredness in the woman's face--a hollow, exhausted look as if she were sick of life itself--and the cold dead hardness in her narrowed green eyes."

I can get with that. Anyway, Mackenzie's writing is smooth and assured, and her main character deJong is very cool. Very smart...and very cool.

Another fine reason to enjoy this book is that we get a sense of what life is like in South Africa, to live and to conduct business. It is a melting pot unlike other melting pots, having a set of residents with diverse backgrounds in its own particular ratio.

A crime has taken place but we do not know who is involved until nearly the end, though we gather it has to do with crop failures and an American multinational. So it is cosmopolitan as well.

I loved the pace, the voice, the characters, the unwieldy surprising bulk of the story. And I loved the land, the strangeness of it...so different from any I've seen before. Great storytelling.

[Deb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jade is a likable character and manages to get herself involved in the murder of a young woman, Sonet, who was a base jumper and fell to her death. Jade is hired by Sonet’s jumping partner to find out who the actual killer of Sonet was as he was afraid he would be charged with the murder. This leads to several twists and turns in the story, a hitman leaving bodies in his wake, and Jade teaming up with David to solve this interesting case.

[anarresa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Steady addition to the Jade de Jong series. I found the main mystery (and conspiracy) to be a bit far-fetched this time around, even for the series. The parallel plot about single mom Ntombi who works for a shady businessman to provide for her son and has to drive a terrifying man around was the most interesting. I still like Jade and David Patel and that's all I need to keep reading a mystery series.

[Juanita · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an arc and at first I felt like it was not going to be interesting but I was quite surprised

[Barbara ★ · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first I've read in this series and really enjoyed it. I will be reading further in the series.

[Alison Smith · Rating 3 out of 5]

Feisty South African Jade de Jong, female PI, solves eco-crime. See http://thebooksmithblog.wordpress.com for more.

[Trish Tuthill · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this series. A gripping story, with a scrappy female detective all set in the part of Johannesburg where I grew up.... there is nothing I don’t like. Hope they keep coming.

[Fortunato Ferrara · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's not a bad book, it's good for a few hours of reading...although the final is really rushed.