‘The Heathens’ the newest pageturner from Ace Atkins

CF Foster

“The Gentiles”

Author: Ace Atkins

GP Putnam’s Sons, 400 pages, $ 27

Hero Quinn Colson plays second fiddle in Ace Atkins 11th book in the series with the Tibbehah County Sheriff, Miss. The real star of “The Heathens” is Tanya Jane Byrd, a 17-year-old beauty who is on the run with her “gang” after the gruesome murder of her troubled mother.

Known to everyone as TJ, she, her 9 year old brother John Wesley, her best friend Holly Harkins and her car theft boyfriend Ladarius left after their mother Gina was butchered and found in a jail barrel full of bleach.

TJ is the prime suspect because of her bitter relationship with Gina. Things had peaked recently when Gina TJ’s trust money “invested” in her obnoxious friend’s liquor store.

In her footsteps is US Marshal Lillie Virgil, a former friend and deputy of Sheriff Colson, as the gang heads north and then west.

Colson, who led a troubled youth before becoming an Army Ranger and coming back to clean up his corrupt home, doesn’t believe TJ and his friends are the killers and embarks on a different path populated by some deadly lowlifes.

Atkins fans can rejoice. “The Heathens” is a fast pageturner who holds the standards of the series very well.

CF Foster lives in Riverside.

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