Leo Atkins's hero, Connor Gibbs, runs a private investigations agency, Quixote Enterprises, in Wendover, a small North Carolina city. Here, before too many pages of Dead Run are turned, a well-attended burial takes place. Few funerals are welcome, but this one is particularly tragic: a young father has been slain while successfully protecting his young daughter from a sudden rain of bullets fired in a local diner. Five innocent people were left dead after a particularly nasty gang of bank robbers panicked. Then, with a well-placed shot, Benella Mae Sweet, Connor Gibbs's longtime lady friend, managed to bring down one of the fleeing villains for a total of six dead.

But the plot does not turn on what the innocent victims' survivors experience as a result of their horrible loss. Instead, Atkins hinges his tale on the escalation of the stakes when the dead villain's very mean buddies decide to seek revenge--by teaching Benella a lethal lesson. Now Benella weighs in at about 170 and doesn't scare easily, so vengeance is not as simple a matter as it sounds, though the combined efforts of the sheriff's office, the FBI, and Connor all vying to help protect her seem to have the effect of canceling each other out.

Writing as Leo Atkins, Clay Harvey (who under his own name is the author of the Tyler Vance series) resembles some near-unimaginable blending of Joe R. Lansdale and Margaret Maron. The air of folksy neighborliness makes for just a little icing on the basic tough foundation: these grits are boiled rock hard. --Otto Penzler

Product Description
When Connor's friend Benella Sweet foils a robbery attempt, she makes some very dangerous men very angry-and they're dead-set on getting revenge.

3rd novel in the acclaimed Connor Gibbs, P.I., mystery series

Even though the book is short, the reader is drawn into it because of the sometimes unusual and very human interaction between characters - sometimes between the good guys and the bad guys, and there are even some not so good guys. This is both refreshing and interesting. I have added this to my collection of Clay Harvey books, and am glad he is still writing. I enjoyed this book, and plan to also purchase "Play Dead" and "Dead Beat" by Leo Atkins.


DOA   September 23, 2001
 1 out of 5 found this review helpful

A comic book of a story. No character development. Unlikey relationships. Stupid villains. Read as fast as you can turn the page. Save your time.


Good crime fiction   December 17, 2000
 2 out of 2 found this review helpful

At the same time in Richmond, Virginia; Atlanta, Georgia; and Knoxville, and Tennessee, three pairs of similarly dressed and armed criminals using the identical MOs rob banks. Not long afterward in a family restaurant, two gunmen seemingly set on a heist open fire killing several people. A diner, Benella Mae Sweet manages to kill one of the thugs.

However, the dead felon has close friends who vow vengeance on the avenging amazon who killed one of their own. Meanwhile Benella cares for her young niece Mary Leigh since her brother-in- law Damien died in the fracas and her sister has collapsed in shock. When the thugs abduct Mary Leigh, Benella turns to her lover private investigator Connor Gibbs for help. With the Feds involved and the criminals wanting revenge, anything can still happen and does to Connor and Benella as they attempt to rescue Mary Leigh.

DEAD RUN is and exciting thriller that never lets up until the final page. The story line works because the action seems genuine and the characters real, especially Benella and Connor. The third Connor Gibbs mystery (see DEADBEAT and PLAY DEAD) proves that Leo Atkins is a talent that those fans who enjoy an exciting private investigator yarn will relish this.

Harriet Klausner