Zenka By Alison Brodie

Genre: Fiction, Mystery

Ruthless, devious, and loyal.

Zenka is a Hungarian pole-dancer with a dark past.

When cranky London mob boss, Jack Murray, saves her life she vows to become his guardian angel – whether he likes it or not. Happily, she now has easy access to pistols, knives and shotguns.

Jack discovers he has a son, Nicholas, a male nurse with a heart of gold. Problem is, Nicholas is a wimp.

Zenka takes charges. Using her feminine wiles and gangland contacts, she will turn Nicholas into the son any self-respecting crime boss would be proud of. And she succeeds!

Nicholas transforms from pussycat to mad dog, falls in love with Zenka, and finds out where the bodies are buried – because he buries them. He’s learning fast that sometimes you have to kill, or be killed.

As his life becomes more terrifying, questions have to be asked:

How do you tell a mob boss you don’t want to be his son?

And is Zenka really who she says she is?

*Received as an ARC from the author*

After reading and loving another of Alison’s books Brake Failure I jumped at the chance when she offered to send me her new book Zenka!

Admittedly I was a little hesitant going into this book as I aren’t really a big fan of mob stories however although the main story is about the son of a mob boss the main story is about so much more than that.

Zenka’s accent is prominent throughout the book when she is talking and at the start I wasn’t too sure of it but I think actually it really adds character and makes her seem more realistic.

Throughout the book I liked how the characters did have their flaws and there was a lot of character development. It was interesting to see that Nicholas didn’t immediately become this big strong fighter overnight just because he wanted to be. It happened gradually and I really liked watching this development.

I enjoyed seeing how lies started to spin out of control and that lives started to converge in unexpected ways. At one point I was on the edge of my seat because it was so tense! I knew the truth so I knew this guy had misunderstood what was happening but things kept spiralling out of control!

This book kept me hooked all the way through which I really wasn’t expecting but I just had to see how the story would progress! I would definitely recommend this book, don’t just dismiss it because there are mobsters involved, it is more of a story of family and how lies can make things so much more complicated. Overall it is really fast paced, it has romance, murder, tension…basically everything you could ask for in a book!

Rating: 5/5

Summing up: Fast paced and full of tension!