Bait, Brutes, and Bullets: Tales from New Biloxi - Kyle Perkins, Lila Vale
Set in a futuristic America, Biloxi is a domed city separated from the swamps by a tunnel with automatic guns. There is a lot pf prejudice between the residents of Biloxi (bubble people) and the swamp folk (swampies). Due to the tunnel and only way through is by using a chip visiting each other is rare.
Harvey the owner of the a once popular casino has troubles of his own, new casino owners are moving into his patch and are starting a turf war. One night he comes across a new drug called gator bait and thinks that selling this on his premises will help him win the turf war, so he decides to go to the swamp to find the source.
Turning up to a swamp party in flash gear just enforces the swamp folk’s prejudice and there are some funny moments when he is trying to evade a fight by hiding in the swamp water in a white suit. A young lad rescues him and drops him off at a house for refuge.
In steps Norra a feisty young swamp woman who to make ends meet is making and distributing Gator Bait. She is leading a risky life as a group of enforcers called the Brute are trying to find the supplier so they can profit heavily from the selling of this drug. As soon as Harvey lands on her porch there is a connection and what starts out as a bit of flirting soon becomes more serious. Even when he knows that she is the manufacturer of the drug, and wants to keep their relationship business like, their feelings get the better of both of them.
Written in their POV this book is a great story. Both characters had troubled backgrounds and their relationship had to break down a lot of barriers to survive, but this made it more believable. The way the other characters were written it felt that they were to big happy families each look out for each other.
There was a shock moment when I thought the story was going in a direction I didn’t want it too, but the writing of that scene was great and I understood the reasoning for it.
Whilst reading this book I personally could not tell that it was written by two authors as the story flowed perfectly. I would love to read more about the townspeople of Biloxi and see if they ever did get to Mars
A great read