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Sin & Nicki #2
Regret Things
Check out Nicki McJacob. She was preaching anarchy to Manhattan by the time she was 18. Slinging ads on Madison Avenue before she was 20. And running from the mob shortly after that.
Flash forward 10 years. Nicki's raising a family with her high school sweetheart. She's also fooling around with a sex addict named Grant Derrick. But her past isn't finished with her yet. And everybody she knows - including her little brother, Sin - is about to be pulled into a cycle of violence and regret.
Regret Things is fast-paced American noir. It's also a story about sex, materialism, and just how far people will go to feel wanted.
[T]he rolling smooth language of this sexy noir takes you in, it walks you into a warm bath of trouble you didn’t realize would feel so good. This is classic noir, where the guys hold the guns, but the girl holds the real power. Regret Things is made by Ingwalson’s stylized rhythmic sentences, abrupt, then lolling, in all the right places. Four Stars." - San Francisco Book Review
Flash forward 10 years. Nicki's raising a family with her high school sweetheart. She's also fooling around with a sex addict named Grant Derrick. But her past isn't finished with her yet. And everybody she knows - including her little brother, Sin - is about to be pulled into a cycle of violence and regret.
Regret Things is fast-paced American noir. It's also a story about sex, materialism, and just how far people will go to feel wanted.
[T]he rolling smooth language of this sexy noir takes you in, it walks you into a warm bath of trouble you didn’t realize would feel so good. This is classic noir, where the guys hold the guns, but the girl holds the real power. Regret Things is made by Ingwalson’s stylized rhythmic sentences, abrupt, then lolling, in all the right places. Four Stars." - San Francisco Book Review
- GenresMystery
212 pages, Paperback
First published November 16, 2014
About the author
Matt Ingwalson
18 books45 followersI write all sorts of thrillers - police procedurals, occult horror and absurdist noir. Where to start?
If you're into tricky mysteries without too much violence, give the Owl and Raccoon detective series a try. If you'd prefer to dive into something darker, try Sever and Camille. These two books together tell a nostalgic story full of witchcraft and serial killers. Mary Monster is my most challenging book, a stylized, literary take on gothic noir.
If you're into tricky mysteries without too much violence, give the Owl and Raccoon detective series a try. If you'd prefer to dive into something darker, try Sever and Camille. These two books together tell a nostalgic story full of witchcraft and serial killers. Mary Monster is my most challenging book, a stylized, literary take on gothic noir.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
November 21, 2014
I like it. Which is good, I guess. Since I wrote it.
March 16, 2015
I received a free kindle copy of Regret Things-A Sin & Nicki Thriller by Matt Ingwalson, published by Amazon Digital Books in a goodreads promotion.
Nicki McJacob has had an exciting youth. Sin, her brother comes to the rescue in Las Vegas after her past catches up to her. She met Grant Derrick who is admittedly a sex addict. Her normal life changes radically after she meets him. There are some scary characters trying to find Nicki. Can she get away from them? Can Grant resume his normal life after interacting with the red haired bombshell that is Nicki?
This is a page turning thriller. For me the time jumping was distracting so I gave it four stars.
Link to purchase: http://www.amazon.com/Regret-Things-M...
Nicki McJacob has had an exciting youth. Sin, her brother comes to the rescue in Las Vegas after her past catches up to her. She met Grant Derrick who is admittedly a sex addict. Her normal life changes radically after she meets him. There are some scary characters trying to find Nicki. Can she get away from them? Can Grant resume his normal life after interacting with the red haired bombshell that is Nicki?
This is a page turning thriller. For me the time jumping was distracting so I gave it four stars.
Link to purchase: http://www.amazon.com/Regret-Things-M...
June 6, 2016
You can try to forget the past, but can the past forget you? This might be the central question for the protagonist of this book, Nicki McJacob, and the answer that she ultimately finds is, "no." Her's is a past with secret dark enough to lie about it to everyone--maybe even herself.
In the latest installment of the "Sin Walks into the Desert" series characters, Igwalson tells a gravelly story about things at beginnings, idealism things, hedonism and crime things, and of course, regret things too. Although, the reader might actually decide that for the characters, it's ultimately "no regret" things.
The writing style is similar to his previous works, but this installment is more intense. Mostly dialog driven with a good share of lingo for hard authenticity, the prose is terse and irreverent, gritty and unapologetic. The paragraphs produce graphic images of print black, strobe white and blood red. These primary colors evoking the genre of the graphic novel--black and white unless spattered with red as well.
But the morality is definitely not as stark. The book explodes with a horrific opening chapter where the frightening descriptions are explained with such direct voice that it leaves the reader numb to the desperate consequences, only to understand the full impact later. In subsequent chapters we are all brought up to speed with Nicky's past and sees her character move through distinct phases towards an ultimate reckoning. Readers of "Sin Walks into the Desert" will be pleased to see a reappearance of these characters as they make a powerful descent into the story as if demigods out of myth.
But this story is really about Nicky, and she deserves her own story. This one traverses many cities and decades of time but ends back where Igwalson seems inexorably drawn--in the desert. This is not a story of good guys and bad guys but more like the bad and then even worse. As Nicky says herself, "In this story. I'm the bad guy."
In the latest installment of the "Sin Walks into the Desert" series characters, Igwalson tells a gravelly story about things at beginnings, idealism things, hedonism and crime things, and of course, regret things too. Although, the reader might actually decide that for the characters, it's ultimately "no regret" things.
The writing style is similar to his previous works, but this installment is more intense. Mostly dialog driven with a good share of lingo for hard authenticity, the prose is terse and irreverent, gritty and unapologetic. The paragraphs produce graphic images of print black, strobe white and blood red. These primary colors evoking the genre of the graphic novel--black and white unless spattered with red as well.
But the morality is definitely not as stark. The book explodes with a horrific opening chapter where the frightening descriptions are explained with such direct voice that it leaves the reader numb to the desperate consequences, only to understand the full impact later. In subsequent chapters we are all brought up to speed with Nicky's past and sees her character move through distinct phases towards an ultimate reckoning. Readers of "Sin Walks into the Desert" will be pleased to see a reappearance of these characters as they make a powerful descent into the story as if demigods out of myth.
But this story is really about Nicky, and she deserves her own story. This one traverses many cities and decades of time but ends back where Igwalson seems inexorably drawn--in the desert. This is not a story of good guys and bad guys but more like the bad and then even worse. As Nicky says herself, "In this story. I'm the bad guy."
June 3, 2015
I received this book through an ARC Goodreads Giveaway.
I thought that this was pretty decent for a self-published book (not to in anyway insult self published authors, I've read some very good self published works and many authors self published until they finally caught the attention of a publishing house. However, there is still a stigma attached and the feeling that readers are taken a gamble when they take on something that wasn't filtered through a publishing company.) As far as mysteries/thrillers go this was better than some of the ones I've read put out by the major publishing houses. Ingwalson clearly has some ability as a writer and his character Nikki was compellingly painted.
If I were an editor I would address the places where the book could use a bit more clarity and detail. The scheme that creates the main character's crisis could have been better laid out in regards to the bad guys, this would also increase the suspense in the story. The movement in fight scenes/get aways is also not always clear.
Overall, this is a fast, easy read, perhaps ideal as a "beach read" or during a flight, not something of a lot of substance but certainly entertaining in its own right.
I thought that this was pretty decent for a self-published book (not to in anyway insult self published authors, I've read some very good self published works and many authors self published until they finally caught the attention of a publishing house. However, there is still a stigma attached and the feeling that readers are taken a gamble when they take on something that wasn't filtered through a publishing company.) As far as mysteries/thrillers go this was better than some of the ones I've read put out by the major publishing houses. Ingwalson clearly has some ability as a writer and his character Nikki was compellingly painted.
If I were an editor I would address the places where the book could use a bit more clarity and detail. The scheme that creates the main character's crisis could have been better laid out in regards to the bad guys, this would also increase the suspense in the story. The movement in fight scenes/get aways is also not always clear.
Overall, this is a fast, easy read, perhaps ideal as a "beach read" or during a flight, not something of a lot of substance but certainly entertaining in its own right.
June 2, 2015
We all have regrets in our lives. Nicki McJacobs regrets have dire consequences. The past catches up with her when she has married and has twin girls. The book tells her history from 19 yrs. when she was a wild child and brings one up to present when the consequences of her choices find her and her family. Couldnt put it down as finished in one sitting. Thanks to Goodreads I have another favorite author. Read this book.
June 3, 2015
I won this novel in a goodreads drawing.
A woman with a not so interesting past that catches up with her. The book feels like it was just thrown together very quickly. There is not much to it and not a single one of the characters are very likeable. After all that it was a nice distraction for the time. Not a bad book but not my cup of tea.
A woman with a not so interesting past that catches up with her. The book feels like it was just thrown together very quickly. There is not much to it and not a single one of the characters are very likeable. After all that it was a nice distraction for the time. Not a bad book but not my cup of tea.
June 21, 2015
I won this novel in a goodreads drawing.
A woman's past catches up to her, when the very bad people she stole millions of dollars from find her. Her only hope is to reach out to a sex addict with whom she had a one night stand. Everybody seems confused the whole time.
Not bad, sort of an updated 1950's noir book.
A woman's past catches up to her, when the very bad people she stole millions of dollars from find her. Her only hope is to reach out to a sex addict with whom she had a one night stand. Everybody seems confused the whole time.
Not bad, sort of an updated 1950's noir book.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews