Title:  The Bounty
Author:  Janet Evanovich; Steve Hamilton
Genre:  Mystery/thriller
Rating:  3.5 out of 5

Straight as an arrow special agent Kate O’Hare and international con man Nick Fox have brought down some of the biggest criminals out there. But now they face their most dangerous foe yet—a vast, shadowy international organization known only as the Brotherhood.

Directly descended from the Vatican Bank priests who served Hitler during World War II, the Brotherhood is on a frantic search for a lost train loaded with $30 billion in Nazi gold, untouched for over seventy-five years somewhere in the mountains of Eastern Europe.

Kate and Nick know that there is only one man who can find the fortune and bring down the Brotherhood—the same man who taught Nick everything he knows—his father, Quentin. As the stakes get higher, they must also rely on Kate’s own father, Jake, who shares his daughter’s grit and stubbornness. Too bad they can never agree on anything.

From a remote monastery in the Swiss Alps to the lawless desert of the Western Sahara, Kate, Nick, and the two men who made them who they are today must crisscross the world in a desperate scramble to stop their deadliest foe in the biggest adventure of their lives.

I’m a huge fan of the Stephanie Plum series (well, a huge fan of the first 10 books, then a slightly lesser fan of the rest of them—and I haven’t read the last two.) and I think I read the first book in this series as well.

I enjoyed this read, but it seemed pretty cliched and predictable, like an over-the-top action movie that ends just as you expect it to. I never felt any of the characters were truly in danger, and no matter how seemingly impossible whatever obstacle the characters faced was, it always seemed to have a simple solution—one based more on luck and chance with a bit of deus ex machina thrown in for good measure (I’m looking at you, big guy).

Janet Evanovich is a bestselling author. Steve Hamilton is an award-winning author. Their newest book is The Bounty.

(Galley courtesy of Atria Books in exchange for an honest review.)

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