It is great to be invited to take part in the celebrations for Fearless- Jessie Keane's 'Gritty Gangland Thriller' . Described by her publishers, Pan Macmillan as the authentic voice of gangland crime
fiction, it was published on March 22nd in hardback and in paperback in September 2018.
Fearless is a contemporary gypsy gangland
novel set in London and New
York from 1970s to the present day. A
the heart of this story are two ambitious women both competing for the love of
the same man.
Play dirty, play to win.
Josh Flynn is the king of the bare-knuckle gypsy fighters.
His reputation is un-blemished; his fist a deadly weapon.
Claire Milo has always loved Josh, they were destined to be
together from the day they met. Two gypsy lovers with their whole lives ahead
of them. If only Josh would find a different way of earning a living instead of
knocking the living daylights out of another man in the boxing ring. One day,
she knew something really bad was going to happen. She could feel it . . .
Shauna Everett always wanted what she couldn’t have, and
nobody, especially Claire Milo was going to stand in her way. She’s had her eye
on Josh Flynn for years and she knew just how to get him. If it meant playing
dirty, then so be it. What had she got to lose?
In a world ruled by violence, crime and backstreet brawls,
only one woman will win in Jessie Keane's Fearless, but how low is she prepared
to go to achieve that goal?
My Thoughts
This is not a book for the faint hearted as there are some pretty violent and brutal scenes. However at its heart is a love story triangle between Shauna, Josh and Claire. Shauna turns out to be a thoroughly ruthless and ambitious woman who has set her sights on Josh and no one is going to stand in her way. She really is a vividly drawn character who drives the plot on. Obsessive and possessive, she sets out to have all the best things in life as she sees them and sees Josh as her meal ticket and means to get them.
Claire is quite a contrast. Driven out in brutal fashion at Shauna's behest, she genuinely loves Josh and her family. She is a much softer though a damaged character who tries to protect her family and who cannot abide violence and brawling. She proves to be equally ambitious to survive, in her own way. In Josh, you have someone who seems to drift along and who is sufficiently weak that he lets himself become caught by Shauna. He tries to provide for his family however and puts his own feelings to one side.
Tightly plotted with a cracking pace, I appreciated Jessie Keane's ability to tell a good story.
In short: A fast paced thriller with some heart stopping moments.
About the Author
In Fearless, similar to The Peaky Blinders the men are bare knuckle
fighters and the women are strong and competitive. This is a world Jessie Keane knows well as her
mother and grandmother were Romany gypsies.
Jessie was born the traditional gypsy way in her grandmother's
caravan. Jessie, her mum and her
grandmother all share the gift of 'The Sight' and read the tarot cards. Jessie's grandmother predicted Jessie would
be a well known writer at the age of three-years-of-age.
After a difficult and traumatic childhood which resulted in
Jessie running away aged 15 to Soho, where she met the characters that would
later inspire her crime novels, Jessie changed her identity (name and dyed her
hair) to escape her bullying brothers.
Eventually after she hit rock bottom Jessie decided to sell her wedding
dress to buy a typewriter. She wrote her
first novel Dirty Games and within weeks
of sending it out to agents got a six figure book deal. 12 novels later and almost a million books
sold she now lives in her dream house in Hampshire with a pool, large
garden and chickens running around her orchard.
Thanks to Jessie Keane, Pan Macmillan and Anne Cater of Random Things Tours for a copy of the book and a place on the tour.
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Great review! Thanks for the support x
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