Steven Becker

I received this book from the author for a fair and honest review.

Backwater Channel by Steven Becker is a good murder mystery set in Biscayne Bay and the Miami area. The Kurt Hunter series is about a US Park Service special agent who patrols the Biscayne Bay National Park. He seems to keep finding dead bodies that get him in trouble with his boss.

This time while on his own and looking for fishing spots for bonefish, he comes across a dead body just outside the cooling water channels used show more for a local power plant. He calls in the Miami police regarding the dead body. To his bosses disappointment, Kurt gets assigned to handle the investigation. The investigation leads off into competing environmental groups protesting the power plant. One group wants it shut down over the pollution and warm water discharges to the bay or installing cooling towers. Another group is fighting to keep the warm water discharges that have allowed American Crocodiles to thrive in the cooling ponds and canals.

I will stop with the story line at this point so I don't spoil it for you. I found this to be a good murder mystery with several characters that are interesting. It is also a quick read that is good for vacation reading. show less

A routine day at sea takes an unusual turn when the fishermen catch more than what they bargained for.
What they pulled from the water had the potential to change the future of the country and the future of some very important people.
The characters in this book were well defined and became real, not just names on a page. The plot was riveting, and kept me turning pages. The end was not at all predictable.
I received a copy of this book for free in exchange for posting an honest review.

This is a very short story that gives you a chance to sample the author's writing style. I'm interested in reading one of his longer books. Wood's Ledge had plenty of action, but it was too short to really flesh out the characters and the 'bad guys' kind of felt like Scooby Doo villains.

The Tuna Tango by Steven Becker is a novel about a down on his luck contractor who is forced to leave the Keys for Tampa after a hurricane. It is similar to his Mac Travis novels.

Will and his girl friend are forced to relocate to the Tampa Bay area after a hurricane destroys his unfinished house in the Florida Keys. Sheryl returns to college and works nights as a waitress in a bar. Will is sort of stumbling around between jobs, thinking about starting a paddle board fishing business. He has show more lost his contractor's license and can't bid construction jobs. A former fishing client of his in the Keys and fish wholesaler talks him into doing a renovation of a fish house for him on the side. It is a dilapidated building on piles over one of the boat channels in the Tampa Bay region. The owner wants it done for as cheap as possible because if the renovation costs more than the half the value of the building it will have to be torn down and rebuilt to code. This would keep the building from being on piles out over a portion of the channel and restrict the ability of the wholesaler of bringing fish directly to the fish house from the boats.

Will takes on the job to keep the girl friend happy. It becomes a cascading set of problems with the job and the girl friend. Will has little money and no license. He is forced to use a couple of dopers, the girl friend sends his way that need some extra money for college and dope. The wholesaler is involved in an illegal fishing scheme with a local fisherman with a sketching legal history. Will is forced to rescue his girl friend from the fisherman who has kidnapped her to try and control Will and keep the project moving forward and keep the cops out of the way.

This is a good quick read that will entertain you. show less