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Maggie Thomas doesn't know the first thing about being a private eye. She quickly discovers that running her uncle's faltering Miami Beach P.I. agency is nothing like watching detective show reruns. Even the private eye app on her iPhone can't help.

But Maggie's first case is surprisingly easy...or so she thinks until she stumbles upon a dead body. With whizzing bullets, car chases, and spandex-clad bodybuilders, Maggie wonders if she's in over her head. Jake Jackson, the dangerously charming cop, thinks Maggie needs to stick to snapping pictures of cheating husbands and leave the detective work to the professionals.

The danger escalates when another homicide victim washes up on the shore and now someone wants to stop Maggie from solving the murders. With the help of her knitting needle–wielding, orthopedic shoe–wearing assistant Dorothy Raye, Maggie must solve the case before she's the next victim of this crime wave.

244 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 23, 2013

593 people are currently reading
664 people want to read

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Rose Pressey

45 books14 followers

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5 stars
365 (25%)
4 stars
504 (35%)
3 stars
375 (26%)
2 stars
122 (8%)
1 star
48 (3%)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 112 reviews
Profile Image for Ian.
1,428 reviews183 followers
February 4, 2014
Stephanie Plum Maggie Thomas is a bounty hunter private investigator. With some help from her grandma Mazur her orthopaedic shoe wearing assistant Dorothy she embarks on a case to find proof of a cheating wife. Then the husband who hired her turns up dead and the cheating wife has been arrested for the murder. With everyone quite happy to let an innocent woman go to jail, it's left to Stephanie Maggie to find the truth.

And adding to her troubles sexy cop Morelli Jake keeps sneaking up on her, and what with stalking and police harassment being legal in Florida there is little she can do except go out with him on a date.


Yeah, this book was awful.
Profile Image for ☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎.
1,749 reviews165 followers
March 4, 2019
Maggie is new to the private eye biz but she tries hard to do her job except when her so call easy job of finding a cheating spouse ends up with a dead body. As much as she tries to do her job things get worse and then she becomes a target. I really found some moments funny especially with her "knitting friend" that people say she's the grandma instead of her friend but she can be fisty. LOL This was a fun book.
Profile Image for Anastasia.
2,205 reviews100 followers
November 25, 2023
Crime Wave by Rose Pressey is the first book in the Maggie, P.I. Mystery series. Maggie Thomas inherits her uncles Miami Beach detective agency along with an elderly assistant Dorothy Raye and when her first client ends up dead, she is hired to investigate his murder. I enjoyed this book very much. Maggie is likeable and not afraid to take on any situation and she has great support from Dorothy and the cute detective, Jake Jackson. A nice start to the series and a quick and easy and relaxing read.
Profile Image for Dharia Scarab.
3,255 reviews8 followers
February 14, 2015

Since I don't normally write reviews unless I have something specific to say, here's the break down of how I rate my books...

1 star... This book was bad, so bad I may have given up and skipped to the end. I will avoid this author like the plague in the future.

2 stars... This book was not very good, and I won't be reading any more from the author.

3 stars... This book was ok, but I won't go out of my way to read more, But if I find another book by the author for under a dollar I'd pick it up.

4 stars... I really enjoyed this book and will definitely be on the look out to pick up more from the series/author.

5 stars... I loved this book! It has earned a permanent home in my collection and I'll be picking up the rest of the series and other books from the author ASAP.
Profile Image for Clarissa Simmens.
Author 36 books94 followers
July 26, 2013
A definite departure from Rose Pressey's paranormal romances but the main character is certainly similar to her other characters from the other series (Halloween LaVeau, Rylie Cruz, etc.). Maggie Thomas may not be quite as flaky as the others (and I love flaky because I am) but she certainly is pretty close, which can be worrisome, because she's a gun-toting, fully-licensed private investigator and although she can't reanimate ghosts, the potential for disaster is certainly there! I confess, though, that I was hoping at least one of the suspects would be a vampire but alas, no. Still, I enjoyed Crime Wave so much with all its little subtleties (Maggie Thomas' dad's first name is Dylan!) and funny scenes that made me laugh out loud. I'm looking forward to watching Maggie grow through this new series.
Profile Image for Layla Darnell.
149 reviews5 followers
July 26, 2013
Wonderful and quirky crime mystery. Maggie Thomas inherits an PI firm from her deceased uncle as well as a spunky grandmotherly assistant. Her first case is more then she bargains for and finds herself in deeper then she ever imagined. Throw in a sexy detective to the mix who seems to show up everywhere and you're guaranteed a fun entertaining story. Murder, affairs, corruption, and lots of laughs this book has it all!
Profile Image for Elizabeth Edwards.
5,546 reviews9 followers
June 1, 2018
I love a good mystery. ( ; I love a good mystery, I see there are 4 books in this series, love this cover, read it thx 2 prime reading on Amazon … such a great fun quick read for me. ( :
798 reviews26 followers
April 17, 2020
The MC gets downsized from a telemarketer firm and inherits her uncle's private investigation firm, specializing in cheating spouses. Along with the firm she inherits her uncle's secretary as a provision of the inheritance. This secretary is a feisty senior citizen. When she is asked to catch a cheating spouse and the man that hired her ends up dead, the spouse hires her to find the killer.

This was a good plot but the reason it got only a 3 is that the ending was very abrupt. It needed a lot more buy in. It made sense and about who was the villain but one minute you were going along looking for clues and the next minute the author had solved the crime. Other than that the writing was fairly good and I would read on in the series because there is potential with the cast of characters. I liked the MC and secretary but ending needed work.
Profile Image for Janet.
3,251 reviews24 followers
April 28, 2020
Maggie Thomas takes over her uncle's P.I. firm after he leaves it to her in his will. She thinks it'll be easy catching cheating spouses. The guy who hires her ends up dead, and now his wife has hired her to find his killer. Now, another body turns up, plus Maggie has an annoying cop on her tail. She's determined to find a killer before she ends up dead too.

Fast read and entertaining! This was so much fun to read. Maggie and her assistant Dorothy, make a hilarious duo. There's plenty of action with these two crazy women. The next adventure is sure to be just as fun. I can't wait to see what they get up to next.
Profile Image for Emmalynn.
2,924 reviews28 followers
January 14, 2023
Maggie is … ridiculous.Dorothy calls it as she sees it and even she sees that Maggie is an idiot at times. Jack is pretty much a stalker cop!! The mystery itself is not bad if not for those other issues.
Profile Image for Jennifer.
32 reviews
June 2, 2018
Cute.

Cute & easy read. Some parts were highly unbelievable- such as a door almost always being unlocked at a private residence- and somewhat predictable.
Profile Image for Danielle Bullen.
Author 3 books193 followers
September 6, 2022
So, I remember the book I read in my teens in this series as being highly entertaining.

So I picked this one up.

And was immediately surprised by how one-dementional every character in it was. They all had their defining characteristic, and that was basically it. It also bothered me quite a bit how many stupid things Maggie did without any real consequences, because the big hunky cop, who was basically only in there to be hunky and smile at inappropriate moments, and look hot, just humored her, when she should have been getting, I don't know, put under police surveillance, arrested for tresspassing or breaking and entering, or generally causing mayhem with the assistant, who was only there to knit and make saucy remarks.

I should have known better. But I didn't.
Profile Image for Caitlin C.
505 reviews14 followers
July 14, 2016
Maggie has just moved to Miami to start running the PI business her uncle left her when he died. She is ready with a PI license, but no idea where to start! She thinks she's set when a guy comes in and asks her to follow his cheating spouse, but things get very complicated when she finds him dead in his apartment! Maggie and her new assistant, Dorothy set off to find the killer while trying not to be killed themselves!
Profile Image for Harmony.
417 reviews7 followers
April 18, 2021
Maggie is a PI but she's not a very good one. She fell into being one because her deceased uncle left her his business. She majored in criminal justice in college before switching over to fashion design to make her mother happy. She doesn't seem to have learned anything from her courses. She has a conceal carry permit but forgets her weapon half the time. She's bumbling and can barely chew gum and walk at the same time.

You'd think I'd hate her? Oddly enough, I didn't. I kind of liked her. She's spunky and funny. I hope that she eventually grows into her role as a PI. I also hope that she invests in some self-defense classes because she's rather clueless.

I did enjoy that she was the one to save the day in the end, it's why I'm holding out hope for her and this series. There were some very good and intriguing glimmers of the character that she may become someday.

I enjoyed her relationship with her assistant, Dorothy. That senior citizen is just as spunky as Maggie and had me laughing at her antics. Never get in a car with her! LOL.

I also enjoyed her budding relationship with the hottie detective Jake Jackson. They had some smoking hot chemistry! I loved that he found her amusing instead of annoying. He's also secure and confident enough that he didn't feel the need to act macho when she was the one to save the day. He got major points from me for that.

The mystery was a good one, tons of red herrings to confuse the reader. It was a little thin with the culprit and the plot clearly visible. However, I was enjoying getting to know Maggie, Dorothy, and Jake so much that I didn't care.
Profile Image for Jennifer (Jaye) (checking back in slowly).
1,075 reviews60 followers
May 7, 2020
*Light Read with a Subtle Edge*

Well this story is about Maggie whose uncle has died and she makes a decision to take over his tired looking detective agency. She inherits her uncle’s assistant Dorothy who is much older but for me she is my favourite character due to her ballsy no nonsense attitude and quick quips I found hilarious. Her insistence to go along with Maggie to hunt the bad guys whilst ferociously knitting away or clacking away as Maggie would put it so funny. Maggie is hoping to learn as the job goes on finds herself learning very quickly.

Maggie gets her first case a case of a husband suspecting his wife of having an affair and all he needed was the evidence. This case seems very straightforward on paper to Maggie but it turns out to be anything but. As Maggie starts her investigations she meets Jake a detective and there is an obvious attraction but I am so glad the story didn’t end up focusing on their attraction even though their paths crossed many times as their cases started to overlap. This is a story of infidelities, murders and so much more.
389 reviews14 followers
January 22, 2022
I started this book a while ago and left it for a few months. The story itself is not too bad but the writing put me off. How many times does Maggie, the P.I., have to meet up with the gorgeous Jake Jackson, the police detective with the quirky smile? It seems he appears way too often and she is nasty to him. Their conversations take up a lot of the book and don't really add to character development or plot movement.
Maggie is a newbie to the P.I. game, having taken over her uncle's business after his death. Her first case has her being hired by the wife of a murdered lawyer. The wife has been arrested for her husband's murder and is in jail. She is adamant that she is innocent and she wants Maggie to find out who actually killed her husband. There are car chases, shots fired, break ins, another body on the beach. And Jake and Maggie continually meet up at various locations by accident or by design. I was tempted to stop reading the book but decided to skip a bunch of chapters and go to the end.
I won't follow this writer even if the books are free.
Profile Image for Leigh.
175 reviews
October 27, 2018
This was my first Kindle book. I was resisting, because I really like the feel of a book in my hand and anything with a screen makes it feel like work. But, my husband downloaded the book for me with Amazon Prime, and it started a new reading frenzy.

Crime Wave was a perfect book for my first Kindle book. I was traveling, so reading in bits and spurts was inevitable. This book fit the bill perfectly - engaging enough to pick up while sitting in the airport, but I could turn off the screen when boarding and other pesky travel things. While I still like my books, I have picked up on reading my Kindle - particularly when I travel.

The story is of a young P.I. investigating her first murder. Inherited firm, crush on cop, knitting secretary, blah, blah, blah. Nothing too different or amazing here. But the book kept me reading and I wanted to see what would happen next. A great summer read.
Profile Image for Cheryl Landmark.
Author 6 books111 followers
August 10, 2023
Actual Rating: 2.5 Stars

Just couldn't give it a full 3 stars. It wasn't really bad. And, it did have some humourous moments. But, it also had a lot of ridiculous, eye-rolling moments in which the main character, Maggie, acted like a complete idiot and pulled some eyebrow-raising, stupid moves. Dorothy, Maggie's older assistant with orthopedic shoes and ever-present knitting needles, was a pretty good character, who tried to rein in some of Maggie's more ludicrous and silly ideas and be the voice of reason.

Jake, the ultra-sexy, outrageously handsome cop (as described ad nauseum by Maggie), struck me more as a creepy stalker, who made a habit of following Maggie everywhere and sneaking up on her. But, his sexy smile and irresistible dimples made it all okay in Maggie's mind. Ugh!

Another point of contention was the rushed and rather bizarre ending. Not sure if I will read any more of this series.
Profile Image for Neena Christianson Martin.
1,185 reviews11 followers
September 19, 2017
Is everybody a bad guy?

Maggie has been left her uncles struggling private investigator business and is determined to make a success of it. She gets her first case, a cheating spouse, and before she can tell her new client he was right he's found murdered. Now she gets her second case as she is hired by the cheating wife to prove that she didn't kill her husband. Maggie and her inherited assistant Dorothy, get into all kinds of trouble solving the mystery, good thing the lead police investigator keeps showing up to help them on their quests.
Profile Image for Brooke Ryser.
3 reviews
July 27, 2018
This book was predictable and not very interesting to read. I read it because it was free for Amazon Prime but there wasn’t a very exciting plot and it was easy to predict what would happen at any moment before Maggie figured something out. And the whole this with the cop Jake was super unnecessary and almost annoying. It also seemed as if random little distractions were added in at random to add interest to the mystery, but they weren’t very good. They made things a lot more confusing. I don’t know, it was sort of fun to read but I wouldn’t recommend it to my friends.
Profile Image for Debi.
326 reviews
May 4, 2018
I really wanted to like this book but the farther I got the worse it got. I hate giving bad reviews but this was just not a well written book. The main character was truly annoying. The non-stop questions she had running in her head were ridiculous. I rushed to finish it because I had invested enough time that I decided to read to the end. I have already deleted it and sadly went and deleted the other 3 in the series that I had on my Kindle thanks to a trial of Unlimited.
Profile Image for Irma Burres.
66 reviews
April 14, 2018
A great story

Rose Pressey has a great story telling talent! I absolutely loved reading her books. Maggie and Jakes professional and personal relationships are always clashing at the wrong time for all the right reasons! Dorothy is a hoot as a sidekick. Hope u enjoy her books as much as I do
Profile Image for Melissa Gray.
104 reviews
July 12, 2018
Easy to read, light crime

I particularly liked the character of Dorothy but I struggled with Pressey's writing style - heavy on description, continuity issues and some stilted dialogue - and I felt the end was a bit rushed. The plot was good generally and it was lighthearted for crime, which is what I was looking for.
848 reviews4 followers
September 15, 2019
4.8 stars for Crime Wave; definitely a fun start to a new series.

I love all of Rose Pressey's stories and hope she never quits writing. This story was a kick with brand new P.I. and her kooky assistant. The whole story was humorous and silly, but the light touch of romance gives me something else to look forward to. Give yourself a break and read something just for fun!
294 reviews
October 30, 2022
Fun

I really enjoyed this book , I thought it was funny, I laughed throughout the whole book. Maggie Thomas moves to Florida and takes over her uncle's P.I. Agency , her assistant who worked for her uncle and now works for her ,she is such a funny little old lady, I laughed, she made the story even better. It's a good light mystery.
9 reviews
July 23, 2018
Not very suspenseful at the key moments

The story flowed but just rolled right through the events that should have been frightening. Two glaring misses by the proof readers were more jarring.
138 reviews3 followers
July 27, 2018
Such FUN🍸

Every once in awhile I have the urge to read a whimsical cozy mystery. I definitely chose wisely. Storyline was quite entertaining and she is an author to read without question. XLNT!!!!
7 reviews
August 14, 2018
Highly recommend

This book was a lot of fun to read. I love the characters, and it made me laugh out loud. I'm going to get started on the next one. I especially love that it is a series. I'm going to read all of them by Rose.
347 reviews2 followers
September 8, 2018
Another one.

Another story where the woman solves the mystery for the cop/sheriff/detective. And, of course, they fall for each other, but it doesn't get very far. This is definitely my least favorite book of genre.
11 reviews
September 24, 2018
Good pastime novel

I loved the book! Flow was really good, but I gave this rating as I felt that content can be little more! At some places I felt it was rushed up, otherwise great read. I picked this book as I love detective series.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 112 reviews

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