A complex and intriguing procedural which mixes environmental disaster, corruption, and murder. And it's got a unique protagonist in Det. Koa Kane, Loved the Hawaii setting and the gray moral areas Kane inhabits, Thanks to netgalley for the ARC. A good read.

Fire and Vengeance is the second Robert McCaw book that I’ve reviewed, and it’s the third in the series with the protagonist Chief Detective Koa Kane who lives and works on the big island of Hawaii. I raved about the second book, Off the Grid, and this one is equally gripping. In the midst of a massive storm there’s a volcanic eruption. A grade school, KonaWili, was built directly over a volcanic vent and the eruption happened when the school was full. 50 people were killed, mostly students along with some teachers. In the course of the investigation, it was discovered that someone tried, and failed, to plug the volcanic vent. Given that the Chief of the department was on the mainland for surgery, the responsibility for dealing with all of the fallout was left to Kane.

McCaw captured the essence of this heartbreaking disaster, and Koa began the investigation which uncovered a feud between political rivals, the local mayor George Tanaka and Governor Bobbie Mahoe. Kane also learned about the longstanding corruption of the landed class of Hawaii who continued to control development on the islands. Kane learned that Francine Na’auao, the Department of Education chief, had an apparent ownership in the housing development where the school was located. But, the money was well hidden and Kane wasn’t sure how he could prove it.

The book is about untangling these stories and the politcal infighting. Also interesting is McCaw's development of Kane's younger brother who had a longstanding history of psychopathic behaviors. This story kept me engaged. Now, I’ll go back and pick up McCaw’s first book in the series, Death of a Messenger.

Also need to mention that this is another winner from Oceanview Publishing.

I really enjoyed this book, lots of suspense and action, all set on the Big Island of Hawaii. The volcano was a central character, and when steam vents burst under a school and leave children dead and injured, Chief Koa Kane is determined to find the cause.

This is the 3rd book in the series, I read it as a standalone but went back and read the first two books.
I recommend this book, it’s not your usual detective fiction. 4 stars.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

Greed and Corruption

A mystery set in Hawaii featuring detective Koa. A detective with a past and a criminal brother takes on an extremely emotional case. An elementary school is built over a Volcanic vent and blows killing fourteen students and two teachers. Detective Koa investigates and finds that the builder's knew about the fault before the school was built which makes it a murder case.

In his investigations the case takes the detective into the highest reaches of Hawaiian government and the seediest bars. He finds greed, corruption, and misuse of political power everywhere he turns. It seems the suspects are never ending.

As he stretches his investigation he becomes emotional involved in his criminal brother's case and tries to help his brother at the same time he is investigating the crime he is working on. This is very stressful for him, but he must do what he can to help bring his family back together for his mother.

He will find in investigating is crime evidence suggesting the cover ups and political misuse goes way back over 40 years ago to a college sorority. A lot of twists and turns, corpses and dangerous people in this story. Can Detective Koa solve the case, or will the Governor or the Mayor shut it down? Who is the ringleader and can he be brought to justice?

If you like mysteries and Hawaii you will like this one. It is a good mystery thriller and you will enjoy reading it, I did. I would recommend this book.

Thanks to Robert McCaw, Oceanview Publishing and NetGalley for allowing me to read a complimentary copy for my honest review.

Complex and satisfying .. exploring a very different culture and combination crime and catastrophic environmental issue . A school built on top of an active volcano! The robust and complex detective exploring this gets in deep .. very appealing 'heavy' .. moral ambivalence is looked into .. excellent discovery and I will be looking for more of this mature writer s work.

This book made me wish I was in Hawaii! The descriptions were amazing! The mystery had me guessing and wondering if anything like this could really happen in real life. Enjoyable read!

Corruption, Volcano, Elementary School- - What could possibly go wrong?! Tragically a lot!
Each short chapter led to another clue and suspect in the tense investigation in Hawaii. This book kept me totally on edge from start to finish! A Must Read!
Trigger Warnings: Destruction, Death, Language

This is a well written, suspenseful novel that I could not put down. The unique plot centres around the explosion of an elementary school that resulted in many deaths and an exposure of bribes, treachery and murder that traces back many years.

We meet our main character, Chief Detective Koa. Koa has had an unique family history and this has made him into the person who he is. He feels tremendous guilt over murdering a man (not on purpose and the person was someone who likely very much deserved punishment although not in any way making it right) and this has shaped his actions ever since. He is estranged from his brother, who appears cruel, thoughtless and blames everyone but himself for his own actions. Their Mother is an incredible woman who loves her family with all of her heart and wants more than anything to see their relationship solidified. I loved how their relationships developed in this story (I can’t say too much as this would give a lot of it away!).

When an elementary school explodes, Koa is one of the first responders on the scene. It is then that they discover that the school was actually built on top of a volcanic vent and not only that, but the builders knew as they tried to hide the evidence. Koa will not stand for this and is determined to bring justice to those that could have prevented this tragedy. He begins to uncover years of treachery, bribes and murder – some at high levels of government. Their acts will leave you shocked and in disbelief, the bribery and deceit goes back so many years and seems to build on each one with a few becoming quite rich off of the backs of others.

This is an excellent novel from start to finish – it kept me on my toes (but not in a bad way as it was still easy to follow). I loved the layers to this story, I could never had envisioned the ending but it was perfect for this novel. This is a definite must read – take advantage of this downtime and pick up a copy of this book, you will not be disappointed.

Chief Detective Koa Kāne of Hilo, Hawai'i discovers that an elementary school was placed on a volcanic vent, which explodes. Others involved in the construction are murdered, and at the same time Koa's brother collapses in jail from a previously undiagnosed brain tumor. Koa tries to help his br
other as he unravels a forty year old conspiracy, but he may have to choose between them.

This is the second book in the Koa Kāne series, but I didn't read the first one. I had no problem getting to know Koa and his family, as they were introduced and some of their story came out in pieces as they talked. The main thrust of the opening quarter of the novel is the destroyed elementary school. It's clear as soon as Koa and his team dig into the fiasco that every official knew, and were perfectly willing to look the other way and simply plug a volcano vent with concrete. Every character other than the politicians are rightfully horrified by this.

The search through records, which can come across as dry in some novels, is lightened by humor with Koa's team, and the earnestness of those willing to get to the truth, regardless of the political process. The information about Koa's brother is fascinating, and brings home the conflict of the novel: doing the right thing, bringing justice to the wronged, and making up for the wrongs of the past. Koa has his own demons that drive him forward, and he brings a very human face to the search for justice among a corrupt government.

I love the setting of this book. How can you go wrong with a book set in Hawaii? A complex, crime thriller of a story line. This book is a quick read because you can't put it down. The write does an excellent job of drawing you in and making you care about these characters and situations. As you follow along each twist and turn and learn some Hawaiian names and terms, some I still don't know what they mean, but it doesn't take away from the story line. As the Hawaiian waters get murky with all this new information there is really only one way to clear t he water and that is finding out who are the key players and what they were trying to cover up.
This is a great book for anyone who loves crime dramas or thriller books.

this was a great mystery series, the characters were great and I really enjoyed reading this book. I liked Koa Kane as a character.

A fire at a school brings Koa to the scene since the chief is away and he is the ranking police officer available. The scene is ghastly and Koa begins to assist with searching for children still in the school. He was able to retrieve 2 before the fumes overcame him. Because of the heat intensity, he requested a robot to search the remainder of the school that no one had been able to reach. Once the robot was on scene and went into the school, it was discovered that the school was built over the vent for a volcano. This was a criminal act.

At the same time this was going on, Koa's brother was being brought back from an Arizona prison to testify. Koa's brother had always been violent and it was no different when Koa met him at the jail. As time went on, Koa's brother suffered a seizure and a brain tumor was discovered.

While Koa was investigating the crime that was a result of the school fire, people who had been involved were being killed. As more information was received, it led to the discovery of a crime that had been committed 40 years earlier.

To find out who was responsible for the school building and what the earlier crime contributed, and how Koa's brother made out, then you must read this book, the action is immense.

The description intrigued me - and I'm always up for a new-to-me series - so I happily accepted the publisher's invitation to read it. Now I've finished, and I found it to be an interesting, and for many reasons unique, plot.

I do have to say that reading it was a bit of a struggle for me, given that I'm almost totally unfamiliar with Hawaiian given and surnames. In part, that's my bad; after all, Hawaii has been a U.S. state since 1959 (the year I graduated from high school, in fact). That this many years later the only words and people from Hawaii I knew going into this were "aloha," "mahalo" and Daniel Inouye doesn't exactly put me in a very good light. Still, the abundance of characters and the frequently interspersed Hawaiian phrases made the reading slower than my usual speed of light (notably, though, the meanings of those phrases are always explained).

I'm not sure where the book falls in the series - Amazon calls it No. 2 and Goodreads says No. 3 - but it seemed to me to stand alone quite well. The star of the show is Detective Koa Kane, who, as the official description says, isn't from "a typical law enforcement family." For one thing, he's a murderer who never got caught; for another, his younger brother has been in trouble with the law ever since he was a child and currently is in jail with four more years to go on his sentence.

The story begins with an horrific blast: The sudden eruption of a volcano that's still classified as active but has been quiet for 200 years. When it blew this time, it took with it most of a school that was built recently right at the top (I know, I can't fathom why anyone would do that either, but then Hawaiians are far more used to living with volcanoes than I am). Some children and teachers were killed in the blast; making matters worse, though, is the realization that someone - or several someones - involved in the building process knew that the school would be situated right over a volcanic vent (fumerole) and tried to cover it up with concrete.

As the investigation heats up, Kane gets another blow: His brother collapses in jail, and afterward it is learned that he has a previously undiagnosed brain tumor. That, in turn, leads Kane to split his efforts between solving what has become a crime at the school and trying to get his brother an early release from prison. And at the outset, both become seemingly impossible tasks.

He may be down - especially when conspiracy rears its ugly head - but he's not out. From this point on, the action picks up on both fronts; on the negative side, it's hard for him to tell the bad guys and gals from the good. On the positive side, he's got several loyal friends and sources who are well qualified, and willing, to help. All in all, an enjoyable book - and I look forward to the next one.

Chief Detective Koa Kane is not an ordinary cop. He has murdered someone who was threatening family member .. and gotten away with it. His younger brother has been convicted of numerous, multiple crimes. His is not a typical law enforcement family. Yet it is his fervent wish to pursue justice and give victims and their families closure.

BOOK BLURB: Never has Koa's motivation been greater than when he learns that an elementary school was placed atop a volcanic vent, which has now exploded. The subsequent murders of the school's contractor and architect only add urgency to his search for the truth.

While his investigation takes off, he's confronted with a family problem. His brother has a previously undiagnosed brain tumor. Kane will go to great lengths to get his brother out of prison.

BOOK BLURB: As Koa gradually unravels the obscure connections between multiple suspects, he uncovers a forty-year-old conspiracy. When he is about to apprehend the perpetrators, his investigation suddenly becomes entwined with his brother's future, forcing Koa to choose between justice for the victims and his brother's freedom.

Kane and his are faced with an explosive crime, a corrupt government committed to a cover-up and billowing issues with his family.

This is a well written crime fiction / mystery that is well paced from beginning to end. The characters are deftly drawn and lend a credible feel to the story. The two stories are woven together with great care. Multiple suspects to watch lead to a stunning conclusion. Although second in the series, this serves well as a stand alone. I do, however, recommend reading them in order.

Many thanks to the author / Oceanview Publishing/ Netgalley for the digital copy of this crime mystery. Read and reviewed voluntarily, opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.

Set in Hawaii, after a slightly wooden start I am pleased to say this book picked up tremendously and turned into a wonderful, complex crime thriller that puts Hilo Chief Detective Koa Kāne into one of the most difficult situations of this career. Not only does he have crimes to solve but he must balance delicate political interests in the absence of the Police Chief. And the politics get very, very murky indeed. The book opens with drama at the KonaWili school which has somehow been built over a volcanic fumarole (or vent) which is now spewing forth super heated noxious gases and destabilising the whole structure. 14 children and 4 teachers die in the disaster and parents want answers about how this came to be.

Koa starts his investigation but he needs to tread carefully. There are some very influential people involved and someone made the decision to plug the fumarole with tons of concrete. That was never going to work long term but Koa needs to determine who knew what and who is covering things up. There is a lot of money at stake. It all gets even murkier when some of those involved - the building contractor and the architect are murdered. It seems someone is willing to kill to cover up their involvement. But when another link is discovered between the principal players that ties them to a 40 year old crime Koa must tread even more carefully if he wants to net all the conspirators. This is a very high stakes game.

This was a great story with lots of intrigue. It was really well plotted and some of the characters were truly Machiavellian. I did have a problem though with all the Hawaiian names and terms. For example when Pele was first mentioned I didn’t know if it was a person or a place - it turned out to be a Hawaiian fire god. And I still don’t know what a Haole is. Nevertheless the story is easy to follow and meaty enough to satisfy the most ardent crime/thriller buffs. My thanks go to Netgalley, Oceanview Publishing and the author for providing a copy of the book. All opinions are my own.

The torrential rains of Hurricane Ida pour far too much water onto Hualālai Mountain, where it flashes into steam under incredible pressure. One of the volcano’s vents is under KonaWili elementary school, where hundreds of students and teachers are enveloped in yellow sulfuric smoke and white-hot temperatures. As Hilo Chief Detective Koa Kane is helicoptered to the scene, he’s sickened by the sight of so many injured and dead children, or keiki: ”red tags for the critical, and black tags for the dead. Way too many red and black tags.”

A bomb squad robot helps police and firefighters explore the building, where they find inexplicable evidence like a fireproof steel classroom door and a 60-foot-long basement chamber with six-foot-thick concrete walls. The first responders have found visible proof that the building contractor knew the school was situated over a volcanic vent and fruitlessly tried to create barriers against inevitable explosions, for which there are no manmade defenses.

Kane and his rock-solid sergeant, Basa, begin investigating the crime at the express order of Governor Bobbie Mahoe, since the Hilo police chief is in California for surgery. They soon find the building contractor dead, hanging from an electrical cord in his spacious home, and the Micronesian excavator & grader he hired, dying of cancer, confirms that he showed Boyle the active vent. He was given a large bonus to stay quiet, a bonus so large it allowed him to purchase his dirt farm littered with dead bulldozers, rickety houses, and small children. However, he notes sadly, Pele has taken her revenge: his grandson was one of the children who died inside the school.

Not long afterward, the school’s architect, Arthur Witherspoon, is shot dead at point-blank range in his home’s doorway. By that time, it’s clear to Kane and Basu that a massive, murderous cover-up is underway. A well-known developer and a retired county planning official are in the crosshairs, as well as the head of Hawaii’s department of education, but Kane can't figure out what connects them or prompted their cooperation on such a corrupt project, even as someone takes a shot at the developer in his front yard.

And while Kane is dealing with such a horrific conspiracy, his frequent-felon brother, Ikaika, passes out in the county jail and is taken to the hospital, where doctors find a huge, slow-growing brain tumor that has been affecting his behavior since childhood. Is there an explanation for the immense pain Ikaika has caused his family? Is there a possibility he can be paroled for behavior he couldn't control?

Kane is clearly facing the most difficult case of his career – the injuries and deaths of so many children, a tightly interwoven group he can’t penetrate but knows they hold the secrets of the KonaWili disaster – while trying to balance the welfare of his family, especially his felonious brother and his quiet but firmly insistent mother, a respected native healer who adheres to the old ways. Robert McCaw has constructed a tightrope of a novel that stretches the nerves of its readers just as periously as a rope across Hualālai’s crater.

Fire and Vengeance is a modern murder/corruption procedural set in Hawaii and the third book in the Koa Kāne series by Robert McCaw. Released 26th May 2020 by Oceanview, it's 336 pages and available in audio and ebook formats.

This is a procedural with an ensemble cast and the added contrast of what should be an idyllic paradise setting with a horrific corruption/murder scandal and the subsequent murder of a wealthy local construction company owner. The titular protagonist has a conflicted and flawed past himself along with being forced to navigate problems with his immediate family (his brother's incarcerated). There are some scenes (the beginning, with burnt and dead schoolchildren particularly) which might be too graphic for some readers (me included).

The writing is competent but struck me as choppy and abrupt in some places. It reads more like a military thriller (a la Tom Clancy) than a police procedural for a small town police force. I found it somewhat difficult to develop a rapport with the lead character. It's possible that's due to the fact that I read this one as a standalone. I had no trouble following the story, though some of the secondary characters were challenging to keep straight. I also had some issues with the liberal use of the Hawaiian language throughout the book. It added verisimilitude, but where it wasn't explained in context, it left me a bit confused.

I suspect that my issues with the book were due more to my preconceptions than the author's stylistic intentions (i.e., my fault). I went into the book expecting Hawaii Five-0 and got Jack Reacher.

Definitely readable, and enjoyable, just not what I was expecting.Three and a half stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

This is book 3 in the Koa Kane Hawaiian book series and although I haven't read the previous books in the series this can definitely be read as a standalone. The story is about lies, dirty dealings and simple greed with a good measure of guts, determination and family loyalty.

This book started with a bang, which I loved and the action just kept on going. I loved the main story and the secondary plot about Chief Detective Koa Kane's family. I enjoyed reading about the medical condition his brother suffers from and how this impacts Koa Kane's investigation, leaving him possibly compromised.

I found the Hawaiian phrases, place names and the Hawaiian culture that weaved throughout the book to be interesting, informative and added to my overall enjoyment of the novel. This also created a real uniqueness to the book which I adored.

This was a fast-paced book and the page-turner I was looking for. The reveal at the end was well presented and the last piece of the jigsaw was surprising and it tied everything together. The characters were richly described and fully dimensional. I look forward to reading more titles in this series.

Many thanks to Michelle Fitzgerald at FSB Associates for an ARC copy in return for my honest review.

Many Thanks to Net Galley, Ocean View Publishing and the author for a chance to read and review this book. All opinions are expressed voluntarily.

Robert McCaw writes a very layered police procedural with his latest Fire and Vengeance, book #3 in the Koa Kane Hawaiian mystery series. It can surely be read as stand-alone as I didn’t have any issues following the story of a detective who is assiduous and unrelenting in the pursuit of truth.

The opening chapter of the book was heart breaking as disaster strikes Kona Wili school on Hualalai mountain, a volcanic vent has erupted and the school in the direct line of the high-pressure steam vent is the first to be hit. 14 children and 2 teachers lay dead in the fury of the volcano which has been lying dormant for over 200 years. As Koa begins investigation into the catastrophe, ugly truths materialize into the light. Natural calamities can of course be reasoned with but what about deliberate acts of treachery wherein a group of people can play GOD with the lives of children.

Amidst the exploding investigation that becomes more murkier by the minute Koa is also faced with personal crisis of his wayward brother, Ikaika who is in jail. Koa with his sergeant Basa, Detective Piki and county prosecutor Zeke unravels the hidden agenda of the big shots and politics and greed and even a 40 yr old conspiracy emerges out of the dark.

This was quite a fast-paced thriller with a brilliant cultural background of the Big Island region in the Hawaii. The machination of big wigs heading the various departments, the ploy and subterfuge to thwart the investigation, Koa’s own demons fighting the guilt of having killed another individual, his brother’s plight, each and every part of the story was incredible and keeps the reader hooked line and sinker.

The author has used the Hawaiian dialect and ways of life liberally in the story and am 100% sure I was mispronouncing all the words and although the meaning of some expressions are given along with it, I did feel a break in my pace, reading it all over again for a better grasp of the sentence.

Koa and his team were well etched out and the thrilling action was brisk and culminated in a whirlwind climax. Highly recommended!

This review will be published in my blog https://rainnbooks.com/ and also in Goodreads, Twitter and Amazon India.

I wasn't sure I was going to like this one with yet again more political/police corruption. It ended up being a great read, and I'm going back to read the first two! I love the main character and definitely want to read more of him.