Speak of the Devil by Allison Leotta

Friday 56 Rules: *Grab a book, any book.
*Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader  *Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) that grabs you. *Post it. *Add your (url) post in Linky at Freda's Voice.

A few pages later, Jack stopped flipping and drew in a sharp breath. There, among pictures of cheering people throwing rice at him and Nina, was a blank white spot. A ghost of a rectangle showed where the picture used to be.

Title: Speak of the Devil (Anna Curtis #3) by Allison Leotta
Published August 6, 2013; Touchstone
Source: publisher

Publisher description: "On the very night she gets engaged to the man she loves,  prosecutor Anna Curtis’s professional life takes a shocking turn that threatens everything she holds dear.While Anna is enjoying a romantic dinner, a few miles away a vicious killer known as Diablo—the Devil—leads a group that will clash with Anna’s own investigative team in a fight against human trafficking in D.C. Both groups are caught off guard, with deadly results.

Allison Leotta draws on her experience as a D.C. prosecutor to take readers into the back rooms of the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the hidden world of the Witness Protection Program, and the secret rituals of one of America’s most dangerous gangs. Leotta weaves fact and fiction to create her third novel in the series."

What's your Friday 56 book teaser?

Sunday Salon: Books on Asia and Southeast Asia

Welcome to the Sunday Salon!This post lists new books and links up to It's Monday; What Are You Reading? at Book Journey;  to Mailbox Monday hosted by
BermudaOnion's Weblog, and to Stacking the Shelves by Tynga's Reviews.

I finished reading these three books on Asia, and have a few more to go!

Five Star Billionaire by Tash Aw is a literary novel about five individuals who are in Shanghai to find their fortune. Several of them are from Malaysia; some will be successful and others not. Their stories each analyse what it takes to become a billionaire. For one person at least, you are full of regret.

Bend Not Break: A Life in Two Worlds by Ping Fu is a memoir of life during the Cultural Revolution and life as a new immigrant in America, a book which turns out to be quite controversial, based on comments on amazon and goodreads. The controversy over authenticity of the memoir tend to overshadow the contributions Ping Fu and her company have made to 3D printing and graphic technology.

Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan is a novel about the lives of the uber rich in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong - a story about several families and groups who are clannish as well as competitive in their garish display of wealth. Written with humor and a lot of candor. It ended somewhat abruptly, but overall an enlightening and entertaining read.



A great fan of mysteries as well,  I was delighted to get in the past couple of weeks,

A Conspiracy of Faith

(Click on the covers for their Goodreads descriptions.)
Other books for review:
Nightmare Range, a collection of mystery short stories by Martin Limon
Loss of Innocence by Richard North Patterson, a family drama set in 1968.
The Skull and the Nightingale by Michael Irwin, a dark tale set in 18th century England.

Mysteries and dark tales! What's on your reading list?