Between a Smile and a Tear Written by: Robert Bucchianeri

Hello Fellow book readers. Happy Day after Valentine's day the day of love, or rather the day everyone who’s not madly in love loathes with an all consuming hatred. (on a somewhat related note my hubby bought me book earrings they're mini books so love them!) Well, I read a lot of books about love so I thought let's try to pick something new. Between a smile and  a Tear was anything but a romance novel. It was suspenseful, mysterious, and filled with sorrow. I was quite skeptical when I first started this book I had a difficult time falling into the story as it was written like perhaps you were reading the main characters manuscript. Jack Waters is a writer and a recovering drunk. He's made a lot of mistakes and his wife Sondra and Sam suffered through all of Jack's lying, cheating (only once), and lack of finances. Now though, Jack is ready to change all that and is working hard to make up for his past. The book as I said in the beginning is just slightly disjointed the voice of the book just a tad off key, but as I pushed forward in the reading the multiple voices and stories of the other characters became clearer and easier to pull apart and follow. Jack really is trying but he has a woman whose partner has marked Jack and she believes "Every one of us is conceived in sin and born in corruption and we pass from the stink of the diaper to the stench of the shroud." (Author of Quote Mr. Robert Penn Warren. According to book) Angie, that's her name and she has her own problems, but she's got a job to do and that job involved blackmailing Jack. This is no spoiler as it's in the jacket of the book and it seems Jack is really screwed with this whole blackmail plot and it will drag him into the world of Nick Morelli and characters called Bullwinkle and other shady folks. Can Jack save himself from this scandalous blackmail plot and will his wife and son ever be able to fully trust him? Also, I've never read a book where leeches were used as a means of a threat... that was creative. (Forgive me but c'mon who cannot mention Leeches!?) Well, the book picks up and there are quite a few little twists here and no one can really come away from this whole mess it seems without spilling a little blood.