‘Stuff to Die For’ a moving crime novel

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BY ANTHONY RAINONE / For the Lincoln Journal Star

Skip Moore and James Lessor are best friends living in South Florida, though not enjoying the good life  in “Stuff  to Die For” by Don Bruns (Oceanview Publishing, 283 pages, $24.95). Skip sells security systems, and James is a cook at the Cap’n Crab. Both twentysomething men dream of having real money  and living in one of Miami’s swank mansions, with a garage full of expensive cars.

With a burning aspiration to do better than his dead father, James hits upon the solution: He buys a Chevy box truck. People always have “stuff” to move, and James reasons that the hauling business is their sure-fire ticket to the high life.

Bruns has created two robust, immensely likeable characters, and the novel is narrated by the dry-humored Skip. Some of the plot’s circumstances are clunky, but getting past that, “Stuff” is an entertaining, twisty and humorous ride.

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On their very first job — moving the belongings of the gorgeous Jackie Fuentes’ estranged husband — trouble finds the beer-loving duo. Part of the husband’s “stuff” includes an envelope containing a severed finger. In short order, the boys are asked by wealthy banker Rick Fuentes to find his missing and kidnapped son, Vic, who also happens to be the owner of the severed finger.

The novel is set in South Florida, and the author serves the locale well.  Mansions with Spanish-tiled roofs, long, pristine pools and vast, white stretches of beach are juxtaposed with the less fortunate areas, squat apartments with cement slab patios and dismal views.

And with the Miami setting,  themes of Cuban politics and intertwining government shenanigans soon sprout up, along with a developing level of violence. It is believed that Vic is being held captive by men trying to force Fuentes to help fund a political overthrow in Cuba — men with strong historical and economic ties to the island.

The award-winning Bruns has fun with this new series, and doesn’t mind making jokes at his own expense. At one point in the novel, a shot-at and beaten-up Skip calls 911 and tells them that men are trying to kill him, and that the bad guys plan to take guns to Cuba and start a revolution. The operator listens to him patiently, and then lectures Skip that 911 is meant only for serious calls.

 It’s a self-deprecating moment for the author, and a breath of fresh air in a crime novel. 

Humor aside, Skip displays an intuitive understanding of life that belies his 24 years of age, even if his girlfriend finds him a bit immature at times. 

“Stuff to Die For” is a book to read.      

Anthony Rainone is a freelance writer and has just completed a novel set in Southwest Nebraska.