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Love, Death, and Other
War Stories (2005)
Pasadena Police Detective Roy Gildard finds himself on a collision
course with the ruthless gangster, Johnny "One Shot" King. Roy is determined to catch Johnny, whose vicious gang,
the P-9s, gets involved in a turf war with the Squiggly Lane Gangsters.In the meantime, Roy finds true love and a deeper meaning to his life when his
cop friend and ex-lover, Mary Eloyan, sets him up with the pretty but troubled LA Sheriff’s Deputy Laura Reel. Helping Roy battle the gangsters
is veteran training officer, George Denney, a suspected racist who gets a soft spot for his rookie trainee, the beautiful,
mixed African-American officer, Ingrid Neilson. Together, their efforts to catch Johnny are almost thwarted by the German-Mexican
siblings, Karl and Noemi Bernau, whose red harvest has struck terror in the immigrant community. What the beautiful people don’t
know can hurt them, as the bodies pile up in Pasadena.
"It's not your grandma's
Pasadena. In his debut novel, Love, Death, and Other War Stories...Pasadena police officer Victor Cass shines a harsh
light on a town overrun by vicious gangs--a grim landscape only partially redeemed by the love affair between its police detective
hero and a fetching LA sheriff's deputy." --Los Angeles Magazine "Cass' book is a thriller." --Pasadena
Star-News "The book is emotionally honest and unflinching in its portrayal of the world of crime as seen through a real
police officer's eyes. Its gritty nature is not for the squeamish or conservative." --Pasadena
Weekly
When legal secretary Lorena
Sandoval, who comes from a traditional Mexican family, chooses to be single and celibate while waiting for the right man,
she bumps into the beautiful Argentinean, Miriya Fronzini, a determined girl on the go, whose womanizing hunk of a boyfriend,
Arturo, is cheating on her with a best friend. Lorena learns of this hot affair while she and Miriya become fast friends.
What Lorena doesn't know is that Miriya has a secret lover of her own. Just when Lorena thinks she's met the right man, she
introduces him to Miriya. That's when the real trouble begins. It's girls' night out, friendship drama, and sexy romps in
the land of the telenovela!
"The beautiful
descriptions and vivid details helped bring the story to life. The hilarious dialogue brought me back to the days when all
the women in my family craved the 'soap opera' life through tons and tons of juicy gossip. It has all the drama of a telenovela--sadness,
jealousy, suspicion, and betrayal
--Bela
M., Living La Vida Latina
"Certainly the top attribute of this novel is the characters themselves,
at least in the primary telenovela. Not for the lives they lead or the story they tell, but for who they are. Victor
Cass gives his readers the enlightening opportunity to meet a variety of ethnic characters all living amongst each other without
grouping them into divided racial gangs. Moreover, the reader has the pleasure of meeting a diverse lineup of Latino characters
that come from a variety of South American ancestries and varying generationally that is, some may be first, second, or third
generation US born, while others are immigrants. Readers meet an Argentinean immigrant daughter, a best friend Polish Jew,
an Armenian elementary teacher, a first generation Mexican-American, as well as an Ethiopian waiter, and so on. Each of them
shares her culture, his customs, her language, her dialect, and his prejudices, all the while loving, fighting, lusting, and
making peace."
--Teresa Carbajal Ravet, Sententia Vera
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