Bermuda Schwartz

From the Edgar-nominated, bestselling series that gets better with each book, and an author who constantly surprises, comes Bermuda Schwartz--a tale of hidden treasure, murder, romance, and rum.

A young scuba guide, scouting new dive sites in the shipwreck-laden reefs that rim Bermuda, makes a fatal discovery--a treasure more valuable than gold or jewels. And some people are willing to kill for it.Enter Zack Chasteen, knockabout palm-tree farmer, and his inscrutable Taino associate, Boggy, who have been dragged to Bermuda by Zack's ladylove, Barbara Pickering. She needs their help throwing a gala 75th birthday party for her wealthy and eccentric Aunt Trula. While there, Zack drops by the bank to visit his money, a couple of million dollars earned in recent exploits that he has stashed away in one of the country's notorious tax-free offshore accounts. Big problem: Zack's money is gone and his bankers can't seem to explain where it is or who might have it.Zack is grappling with another issue as well: Where is this whole thing going with him and Barbara Pickering? She's not pressing, but it's clear she'd like to tie the knot, maybe start a family. Is Zack really ready to say, "I do?" As he wrestles with the dilemmas of love and money, both of which may wind up lost, Zack falls in with wise and wily Teddy Schwartz, a legendary Bermudan treasure salvager and one of Aunt Trula's longtime paramours. Schwartz is harboring a few secrets of his own, and Zack is soon crossing paths with a secret sect of religious zealots who are hoping to complete a bloody and tumultuous two-thousand-year-old quest.Suspenseful, laugh-out-loud hilarious, and startlingly original, Bermuda Schwartz is Bob Morris's best book yet, a rollicking island yarn that turns the historical puzzle thriller on its head!

From Publishers WeeklyWisecracking ex-NFL player Zack Chasteen hunts treasure—and people willing to kill for it—in Morris's offbeat third island-themed adventure (after 2005's Jamaica Me Dead). Zack, who now raises palm trees in Florida, embarks for Bermuda with his British girlfriend, Barbara Pickering, and loyal South American associate, Boggy, to deliver some magnificent Madagascar palms to Barbara's wealthy Aunt Trula. But they get sidetracked from landscaping when they discover a wetsuit-clad corpse—his eyes gouged out—tangled in the rocks offshore. Aunt Trula's good friend, Sir Teddy Schwartz, salvager and diver extraordinaire, becomes their guide and a possible suspect when Zack realizes that the murdered diver was after the legendary true cross, a Christian relic lost in a 15th-century shipwreck that has lured obsessed seekers ever since. Wry humor and engaging Bermuda history help propel the plot. Author tour. (Feb.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From BooklistFormer Miami Dolphins linebacker Zack Chasteen absorbed the wisdom of his coaches. One such pearl was "Don't tap dance at the line of scrimmage." So, when a benign trip to Bermuda with his significant other is upset by a brutal murder, and some financial jiggery-pokery robs him of $2 million from a Bermuda bank account, Zack blitzes. He's quickly up to his keister in violent local thugs, the search for sunken treasure, Bermudan police, and his own machinations to recover his two mil. Morris' third Zack novel is amiable, engaging, and brisk, and Zack's direct approach to problem solving is a pleasant change of pace from so many of today's conflicted and complex fictional knights errant. But some readers may feel they've been shorted on character development, and others will miss a strong sense of place. Still, there's a ripping good yarn here, and that will be plenty for those who liked Zack's earlier adventures, Bahamarama (2004) and Jamaica Me Dead (2005). Thomas GaughanCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved