The Death (and Further Adventures) of Silas Winterbottom: The Body Thief

Reader reviewed by Rita Lorraine Hubbard, The Original H.I.R. (Historical Investigative Reporter)

Love a good book full of quirky characters and laugh-out-loud situations? If you do, The Death (and Further Adventures) of Silas Winterbottom, The Body Thief, is the book for you.

Debut author Stephen M. Giles spins a delightfully well-written tale of an impossibly rich, incredibly old, mind-blowingly sinister patriarch named Silas Winterbottom, who has one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel. Yes, Uncle Silas is dying fast, so he asks his nieces Isabella and Adele, and his nephew Milo, to visit him at his rambling estate to see who will inherit his fortune.

The cousins each have their reasons for answering Uncle Silas' call. The hilariously arrogant Isabella is a career criminal looking for that one big score that will land her on easy street for the rest of her life. Gullible Adele needs the inheritance to keep herself out of a horrifying institution for wayward girls. And cousin Milo, who holds Uncle Silas responsible for his parents' gruesome deaths, just wants to see the old prune reap what he sows.

Once the cousins arrive at Uncle Silas', they discover him to be a cold, crippled, calculating man with an unusual fondness for man-eating alligators. They also discover he isn't really interested in a tender family reunion, but something much more deadly! Suddenly the cousins must brave chicken-eating alligators, dark, rambling tunnels, mysterious house-guests, and diabolical doctors who simply love to experiment on unwilling subjects.

This is a refreshing, well-written book with fleshed-out characters that will have you laughing out loud one minute and marveling at how realistic they are the next. The writing is fresh, funny and perfectly-paced, and each character's "voice" is wonderfully authentic.

Thanks, Mr. Giles. Can't wait for the further adventures of the sinister Silas Winterbottom.