S.A. Cosby - King of Ashes

S.A. Cosby continues to impress as one of the "most consistently amazing authors" out there with his 2025 release - King of Ashes. #Everythingburns

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Episode Transcript

(00:17):
Hey, guys, I'm Chris. And I'm Mike.
And welcome back to this week's No Limits.
So through their podcast, How You Doing tonight, Mike A.
Little tired, been busy. We've been reading, but excited
to get on here tonight and talk about.
It's one of the most consistently amazing authors out

(00:38):
there. Shawn Cosby.
Dude, I haven't been this excited to talk to you about a
book in a while. And not that I'm not excited
every time we do like one of ourour standard series, but I kind
of know like how that conversation is going to go like
for the most part, because, you know, generally they, they kind

(00:59):
of all sit within a vibe, But this one man, and he's just
crushing it. It makes me, I never actually
read razor blade tears. It makes me really want to go
read that as well as his My Darkest Prayer, the other book
we haven't like talked about. I don't even know if you've read
that, have you? Right.
No, I haven't. And I know it's one of his
earlier ones. I'd really like to go back to
that. Yeah, they went ahead and

(01:19):
republished it in 2022 when I think he got, you know, big off
of the 1st 2:00. But obviously, you know, we
covered on this back was that onMitch rap pod?
We we covered, we interviewed him very gracious during COVID
covered black top wasteland. Oh yeah.
He's that way. He's.

(01:40):
Gotten a lot busier. We, we can, you know, he's, he's
one of the ones we, we would love to talk to you again.
But in the meantime, we'll have a great time talking about his
book 'cause I, I Can't Sing the highest praises for this book.
Go out, buy the copy, or do yourself one better listen to
the audiobook. Because the same guy, the same

(02:02):
guy. Adam was our white.
Adam was our. White, unbelievable narrator.
He's done all of the books. He has and and you know, that's
a that's a little issue because sometimes I kept thinking Titus
in my head or a little bit and like Adam's so good at
differentiating the characters within a book.
But now that we've had four different books with him and all

(02:23):
the characters are different, you know, it's not a universe.
Sean doesn't write well, he doeswrite in a universe because
there's so much of his style that is real.
I feel like he writes in our universe, the existence S, you
know, the, the North Carolina, Virginia, Mid-Atlantic.
And so that universe exists because our universe exists.
And he's such a realist. But all these books are separate

(02:45):
plots, separate stories. They don't have to do with one
another. Yet the voices sometimes sound
very similar book to book. He's so good as a narrator, he
doesn't do that within book. But now that you've kept it up
book to book, I kept thinking Titus in my head every time
we're with Roman, totally different characters, but you
know, just something about the voices rang the same.
Same with women. His his women are very good and

(03:06):
differentiated within a book, but you start to hear some of
the same voices as different women come up.
Yeah, and I I noticed that too. I kept on Titus.
Is the the police captain right or the?
In all the centers. All the centers, yeah.
Speaking of that, they're going to make that into a series,
television Series, A movie, something like that.
Dude, yeah, I, I don't know all the details of it, but if

(03:29):
there's one thing I don't want to watch a show about, it's the
subject of that book just because it's so heavy.
Like, it'll be an amazing plot. It's made for TV.
Netflix. Just Netflix got it.
OK, The emotional investment. I think that's kind of why I
enjoyed reading this one. The stakes are really high for
the characters. The emotional investment within

(03:50):
their family dynamics is huge. But for some reason it weighed a
little less on me. I remember all the sinners bleed
sat with me. It impacted me.
I was like whoa, this is world shattering.
And this one I was able to to get through a little bit more
easily, although I don't feel the characters within it got
through all that easily. Yeah, it's it's it's much more

(04:12):
of a a darker ending, you know, and very much so the you know,
this book reminds me of The Wire.
It reminds me of Ozark, it reminds me of Narcos.
It you know, all of these great TV shows or, or, you know,
Breaking Bad where you have someone who is thrust into this

(04:36):
universe and then it is subsumedby it, you know, a quote UN
quote innocent person, right. So someone who's, you know, made
it out and and is fine, but thengets dragged in and for him to
like do his version because, youknow, The Wire very, very much
so it does depict a very realistic, you know, life as a

(04:58):
gangster in Baltimore. But ultimately that show was
written by a white man and, you know, who lived from Baltimore,
They had lived in Baltimore. David Simon, like, did a very
good job of that. And each season kind of like
looks from different angles, thepolice, the school, stuff like
that. But this one being written by a
black man being written by someone who grew up in this, you

(05:20):
know, maybe a town or or, you know, knew of people that lived
in a town like this and just bring so much realism to it.
And to do his version of Ozark. And I kept on thinking like he
was he's Marty from, you know, like Jason Bateman's character
in Ozark. Essentially it's, you know, the
guy who gets actually roped in and then he he's having to

(05:42):
constantly make, you know, judgement calls and he even says
it right. Roman even says at one point,
like everything is a decision. Like, and it's it's what you
decide in that moment. It's not regret.
You know, it's not like karma, It's not any of that.
It's like everything, the decision.
Ultimately it's him and his family versus everyone else.

(06:05):
But you can see towards the veryend he becomes what he says like
at one point, right? He's like, I am not this I he
repeats it like 7 times. But he he ultimately becomes
that. Once you get that deep, he
becomes the king of ashes. Yes.
Yeah, what is it the the hero's only hero.
So unless it lives too long to become the villain, what's

(06:26):
what's the whole the spider man Superman, whichever one that's
from. But he he does he become the
villain, he that that ending. Well, First off, there's so much
about the final like 1/4 of thisbook that is explosive within
the family of those scenes. The twists are out of control

(06:48):
and and twist upon twist. You you could have the actual
action twist of the showdown in the warehouse where the police
guy turns on him and he and he'sin in bed with the brothers.
But you can equally have and then he turns the tables on him,
right? It's Austin Powers, you know, he
turns the table on him because he has the guys on the inside

(07:09):
that he's been paying off and he's been bribing to go against
their boss. He becomes the boss, you know,
by going against the boss. Yeah.
Oh, man, all those shows, Ozark,The Wire, Godfather vibes, even
with and then the the theme of family.
I mean, that's true in all of these crime drama stories and
really a lot of gangster storiesis the lengths you go to for

(07:30):
your family. But what's interesting is we
open with him as a financial advisor, kind of a bigwig.
I'm like, he's with these rappers, He's successful people.
He's living in Georgia. And I was like, Atlanta.
I know Sean Love. We talked to him all about, you
know, Southern Virginia and his ideas of the South.
I'm like, interesting, we're going to a big city in Georgia a

(07:52):
little outside of his wheelhouse.
And then Nope, quickly, we're tied into Jefferson Run and
we're taken there and I'm like, Oh yeah, you know, this is Sean
Cosby being himself, pulling on his roots and knowing.
Exactly. You know, the the types of
characters in these types of places, the dynamics.
Everybody knows each other's business.
Everybody knows each other's family history.
Something about the mom, you know, disappearing becomes lore

(08:14):
like for decades that everyone in town knows about.
A bar fight is not just, you know, an unnamed couple of drunk
college kids. You know, a bar fight is like
you're doing something with yourfamily name in public.
It's almost like the town square, right where everyone
sees what you're doing and it reflects on your family and then
it just that setting is awesome.But but the twist all this leads

(08:37):
me to see another big twist is how this family goes through
everything and really falls apart like the twist.
Loses everything. They lose everything and Oh my
God, it's so subtle too. Like Nivea was that her name?
She the sister, she killed the dad.
Like she was the one who gave him the aspirin.

(09:00):
And she's like, it's too late now.
And. I did it.
I did it for nothing like. I did it for nothing, right?
And then the twist, just findingout Roman killed her.
That flashback. That flashback dropped like a
bomb when you find out the sceneabout him accidentally killing
his mom. I know because he's slowly
building up to that, right with it's multiple like little
flashback scenes. You know, we're jumping back to

(09:23):
that day, you know, and you knewthat ultimately that's how
you're going to find out how, how she died, what really
happened. Disappeared.
Yeah. Disappeared.
You know, I, I did not see that coming.
I did not see it being in a freak accident.
Right. Like, not, not that Roman.
Like it would have been too muchif like, Roman had like, beaten

(09:44):
her. Sure, but it was a fight.
Like, yes, it's an accident. Oh yeah, yeah, He finally says
that out loud. But emotions were high, you
know? Like there was tension.
And she did cheat, you know, and, and the, the teenage
brother saw the cheating. And so like this family was
busting at the seams and and it just so happened that at this
moment, this tragic thing takes place.

(10:08):
Yeah, and then the the dad did what?
And ultimately, you realize why he has such compassion for his
dad, why he would do anything for his dad because he realized
that no matter what they said tothe cops, you know, one of them,
we're going to go to to jail. Most likely to.
Lose everything and they did what they had to do.

(10:31):
Lose the business. Yeah, so and then like, that
gets dropped on you like a bomb.And then you're just like, why
don't you just tell your sister,Tell your sister like she's
she's going down this whole path, hating her father, hating
her life, you know, essentially,like all of her relationships,
her life has been messed up because of this event, you know,
hating her father. And she's holding everything

(10:53):
together. She's doing all the hard work.
And ultimately at the end, she leaves the business, leaves
everything I know with nothing so.
She's the hardest working one ofall of them.
In the end, Roman quote UN quotewins.
He is the king of ashes. He is, but at what cost?
In order to do that he everything had to burn down.

(11:13):
And they said at the end everything burns.
He lost his brother, he lost hisfather, lost his mother, lost
his sister essentially. And now he's wrapped up in this
game where he had a quote UN quote legitimate business.
You know, like obviously he brought to the game some more

(11:35):
nefarious aspects of how you make money in the white collar
world. But you know, now he there was
this very subtle turn at the endwhere in a you kind of mention
it like, Oh yeah, he's he's justlike the what were their names?
I know there was a tranquil. Torrent tranquil and torrent

(11:57):
what? Was their last name.
I keep forgetting Carruthers. No, he's the Carruthers.
Oh yeah, they're the Carruthers.Oh, Oh yeah, it's not.
Going to come. Yeah, that's right.
Anyways. Keith Carruthers.
Roman Carruthers. Anyways.
Tranquil are phenomenal villains.
Yes, very much so. But like what?
Oh, so anyways, what I was saying is that, you know, he

(12:22):
quote UN quote wins, but he had to you were you you were saying
that it's different, but it's not because you can see this
very subtle shift at the end where I don't know if it's
Doughboy or one of the other guys like ask some questions and
he he turns and he he pulls a line that I'm pretty sure

(12:44):
Torrance said to him earlier in the game.
You're asking too many questionslike what I say, it doesn't
matter what like what I say goesand that I'm almost positive it
was a a word for word quote for something that he heard from
torn. And.
It's like this building of all right, yeah, he's, you know,

(13:06):
maybe he's he's having the boys.They're not going to be running
and gunning to the neighborhood that, you know, little less
collateral. You know, they're going to be
doing some making their money indifferent ways.
But ultimately he, he likes it. He likes he, he likes that
money. And there was this great quote
that it stuck with me. And then it was funny because I

(13:28):
was reading some of the reviews and, and one of the reviews
quoted this quote and I was like, yes, that's I, I got to
share this. So it's like money is like acid.
It burns everything. Friendships, families, lovers,
husbands, wives is, is very true.
That's ultimately what happened,right?
It's all about the money. He was good at it.
He liked it. He realized that he never.

(13:50):
Yeah, he could have kept on working for who he was working,
you know, whether a year, whether it was his own company
or I, I forget, it was his own company or like he worked as it,
like he was the main partner at this company.
But something about this just it's that primal.
The thrill of the hunt. Yeah, yeah.

(14:10):
Which makes me think every time he's telling Dante like you're
the screw up. I'm doing this because of you.
I got to save your ass and he's you know, it's.
All a lot with it's excuses. But he's back up with letter
family values, right? I'd go to the ends of the earth
for my brother. I think there's a seed inside of
him that is growing that he wants this power and wrapped up

(14:31):
with like the finances. He knows he's good at it.
And I you see that come to fruition.
That final scene where he's silhouetted as jealousy sneaks
around the back of the warehouseand looks in and she sees the
fires burning with him as a silhouette and even mentions,
you know, reminds her of her of a painting she likes about the

(14:52):
fall of the devil. He'd rather rain in hell than be
a servant in the Kingdom of heaven.
It's like, is that what Roman isbecoming?
And not to mention all the Romanthe name and all the Ancient
Rome references for particularlywith him and dude.
Khalil, you need. Yourself a Khalil, everyone
needs. Everyone needs a Khalil.

(15:12):
Or does Khalil just just get himgoing deeper into it?
You know, like the fact that he's got Khalil as his boy, as
his backup, does that keep him in the game where if he didn't
have that crutch, he maybe wouldn't have let this inner
demon grow? Like, is Khalil complicit?
Obviously he's complicit in the act, Like he commits the crimes,

(15:33):
he takes the shots at times. But is he also complicit in
Roman's downfall? I yeah, A a little.
Bit but you know, ultimately he he let it happen.
You know, you know, Khalil reminds me of a lot.
Is the character Mike from Breaking Bad like Jimmy's?

(15:56):
Did you watch Breaking Bad? You're not going to want to hear
this, but. No, don't tell me that.
I watched the pilot and I couldn't get through it.
What I I couldn't. I know.
And everyone's like best show ever made.
I got to pick it up again. I couldn't get through.
I think I tried a second episodeand I couldn't.
I couldn't. I will say the first season, the
first couple episodes are like probably the hardest to get

(16:20):
through, but then once you watchthe first season, 'cause then
you'll be you'll be hooked. No, dude, you alright anyways?
I know, I know, but. There's there's a character.
Like that's on me. That's.
On Khalil for my Breaking Bad fans out there like a Mike who
you know, I made their living asthese, you know, fixer like a

(16:40):
Ray Ray Donovan type. I mean Roman is is in a sense
kind of a fixer. He's a money fixer.
He he makes rich people's problems going away.
He's a Michael Clayton type, but.
Are those guys loyal to the core?
Like as loyal as Khalil and those other stories.
See, that's, see the Khalil's Khalil is a loose cannon, right?

(17:03):
You got to keep sure. You have to make sure that
'cause I think he, like he's theonly one that could potentially
take Roman down. No one else could take like take
Roman down. That's a good point if Khalil
wanted to turn on him. Yeah, it seems like they have a
great relationship, but I mean you, you never.
Know. But you never know.
Yeah. You never.
You never know what skeletons Khalil has in his closet that

(17:23):
would ultimately lead him to do what Roman's doing to all these
other people. That it's a dead dude.
It's a dog eat dog world. But in this book, there's no
hint of that. No the the 2.
Are that are tight, he's as loyal as can be.
Oh, I love you're, you're right.I love those.
Every time he answers the phone he says you know Pax Romana or
you know, beanie Beanie V Cheese, something like.
That Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

(17:46):
I mean, Roman, Dante, his his parents were into something from
from the ancients. Yeah.
You know, that's a great quote you pulled about cash money,
power, like all that plays into it.
But here's another one that thatI pulled that gets to what we're
talking about. Not only Roman, but all the
other gang leaders. Sometimes the man wearing the

(18:06):
crown ain't the man that's supposed to be the king, you
know? The leader isn't always supposed
to be in that position. The king might be the quieter 1,
the subtle one, the one nobody suspected.
Right. But then they'll show their true
colors at some point. And, and The thing is, they get

(18:28):
to choose the time and place. Roman kept telling his brother,
Just wait for we're going to getout of this.
We're going to get through this.The end, you know?
And Dante, where's the end? And I felt like in the
beginning, Rome believed there was an end.
I whacked these dudes, cut off the head of the snake.
Game's over. Debt is, you know, doesn't need
to be paid. And I think he believed that at

(18:49):
1st. And he told Dante, I'll do this
for you. We'll cut the head off the
snake. It's over.
Every time Dante kept asking him, like, this crisis mode
getting worse, how long is this going to go on?
Rome's answers subtly changed tomake you feel less confident
that he thinks it will end. And he knew it wasn't going to
end. And he knew the game.

(19:09):
And the cycle continues. And I think that's why Dante had
to do what he did. Like Dante realized the cycle
and Dante is a pawn in the cycle.
If you think about the chess analogy that that Sean had going
as well in the book, Dante was the pawn always will be the
pawn. He's in he's or Rook, you know,
that comes up a bunch. He's he's never going to be the
king or the queen. And Rome realizes he can go from

(19:34):
pawn to Rook to Bishop to king and Dante can't.
And so if Rome is going to play that game and become king, Dante
has no place in that world anymore.
And I that was moving scene whenhe goes out and and faces the
he. Tries to kill the other gang,
the other gang later. But no, he knew what was going
to happen, though he I don't think he was honestly trying.

(19:56):
Yeah. And then ultimately that that
leads to another stepping stone of Roman becoming the king
because ultimately he gets the head at the end.
Gruesome. Jesus, the competitor.
Yeah, yeah. Just looking this up, very
interesting. I was going to see if Nevaeh had
some Roman ties and no, it's it's a very relatively modern
name, but it's heaven. It's heaven spelled backwards.

(20:21):
Oh dude. Isn't that cool?
John Cosby, this guy, just the depth of his storytelling in the
layers to it are unreal. I, I, you might miss a lot of
these things we're talking about.
I know my first reread, I wasn'tsure what Nevaeh meant or first

(20:42):
read what she meant when she said it's too late.
Like, I already did the thing and I realized it was that she
killed her father, gave him the aspirin, you know, knew about
the medicines and how it would interact.
And then at the same time, I didn't catch Ernesto Salazar's
head was the one he was burning cremating at the end.
So there's a lot of these littlethings.

(21:04):
They come at you fast once that twist is dropped, that you got
to pay attention. Oh, and not to mention the sex
stuff. I was wondering where that was
going, the dominatrix stuff and even jealousy.
Rome gets the girl, but she sayssomething like if she's watching
and burn, does she? She loves both men.

(21:27):
So she's also like a freak herself.
Is she going to be? She seems to be a good influence
through most of this. She's got a steady job working
for the mayor. But then at the same time, I
think she also has a darker sidethat could come out and this And
you know, you're married to the king now you're going to have to
play a different role then, you know, if you were just a side,

(21:47):
you know, side girl, you know, once once you're in bed with the
king, she's all in like, and I feel like that subtle line where
she's like, I love both, both ofthe men, the one that when she
was also dominating him, but also the one where he's showing
the strength. She's like addicted to this as
much as he is, but she doesn't show that.
Do you think he knows She knows that he killed her, her

(22:08):
brothers? Oh, that's a good question.
I don't think so. But will she figure it out?
That means somebody tell her. There's a lot of people that
could tell her too. A.
Lot of people could tell her, but I think she suddenly knows
and she's accepting of it. Yeah, that, you know, that

(22:29):
probably is the right read. I like how it's left open-ended.
It's it's super open. You could totally do another
book of this. All of Roman Carruthers in the
second Dude, there's. So much I would like a book of
him at his powers as height 1st and then the trilogy to end with
his downfall. I think he.
Knew that this game was never hewas never getting out.

(22:50):
There's no end. Yeah, as.
Soon as he met. That other rich black guy in
Richmond who was essentially. Torrent.
And Tranquil's business associates slash essentially
just something like that. Yeah, yeah.
Slate. Something, yeah.
Yeah. 'Cause yeah, I think that was

(23:10):
when he was like. There's other masters.
Another kingpin? There's always someone above
pulling the string, yeah. Exactly.
And you always got to please them.
I think he once you're in the game, you don't get out of the
game. You just got to if you got to.
Win the game, you. Got dominant, you got to win,
you got to. Win the game.
Yeah. Yeah.
Because there was also that subtle.

(23:33):
Note by whether. It was torn or tranquil.
Where he says. He already got permission from
Slade to to kill us like it. So like he's he's already in bed
with him. You know, exactly he was, it was
this whole this whole this wholetime it was 3D chess.
He was playing everybody and he he was kind of foreshadowing it,
you know, like saying, you know,we were we're kind of in on the

(23:54):
game. But ultimately, when we get that
final turn and all of his boys turned his gun on him, like,
wow, this guy, really, he was smarter than than Torrent.
That was a mind. Boggling scene because when,
when was it Chauncey or Clint? Chauncey I think was his name.
The cop, when he turns I'm like Oh my God.

(24:15):
And then when Rome turns the tables on him, I'm like oh and
he was secretly paid. Not really paying off the other
guys, but making them rich because he, he knew from the
beginning his game plan had to be get on the inside.
And I, I was wondering why he wanted to get on the inside.
I was like, does he want to get close enough to eventually, you
know, take the shot or pull a knife?
That wasn't the plan at all. Getting inside to him meant

(24:38):
using his money and influence toget people to have his back to,
to build Curt, you know, to get currency, build loyalty.
And ultimately that was his gameplan, which does take time.
And Dante didn't see it. Dante wasn't, you know, able to
play that long game. He he was, he became a pawn to
Rome where he's like, you got tokeep up this Playboy lifestyle
as a distraction to make people think we're not serious.

(25:01):
I'm not serious. But secretly behind the scenes,
he's buying off all these people, setting them up with
Iras, investment accounts, padding their bank account, and
all of a sudden they'll do his bidding.
So Rome is playing. Deep, deep, deep.
Chess. And I like how the chess analogy
was called out. Not to mention Sean's writing

(25:21):
straight from blacktop wastelandis so vivid, so descriptive.
He can use similes, metaphors, analogies.
He can make so many comparisons to things that his writing just
pops. I feel like every sentence is so
intentional. And that's something that has
gone through every one of his books, every.
Like I I don't know an author who has been that consistent,

(25:44):
not only with great books, but with this level of writing that
almost borderline at times is poetic.
Oh, very much so. It's amazing prose.
It's. Amazing dialogue, but at the
same time behind it all, whetheryou're describing a setting,
family dynamics, character relationships, you're doing it
using this almost poetry and making these and, you know,

(26:06):
comparisons and and similes thatare so vivid to the reader.
His books more than any other I read.
Become real. Even though it's a world so far
and from my upbringing so far and from my background, he's
able to use language that paintsit so vibrantly that the reader

(26:26):
as far and as you are, you know,white boy, you know, grown up on
Long Island, middle income families.
Like I know nothing about his Deep South broken small town
kind of feel. Yet he paints it so well that I
can I, I know who's who. I, I get the dynamics of it all.
I feel like I'm there. Yeah, I mean.
I'm not going to say that I was there, but like growing up in,

(26:50):
you know, Fredericksburg and having my family, you know, like
I have cousins who did hardcore drugs and got caught up in that
kind of stuff. And you know, I never saw any
like sort of. Drug deal, Gangster stuff.
But like just that small town life and everybody knowing
everybody and, you know, someonesleeping with someone else's

(27:11):
husband and stuff like that. And like, I've seen all of that.
And like that was so vivid to me.
And then throwing in this, you know, that's half the reason why
people love The Godfather, love Goodfellas.
Love. The wires, because they want to
be like like that. They want to be the Stringer
bells of the world. They want a taste of it.

(27:31):
Yeah, you know. It's living vicariously through
our reading, movies, TV shows, whatever you know it's and oh,
another gut wrenching scene in this book is when he kills, he
has Cassidy killed. And that is, that is.
Directly taken from Breaking Bad.

(27:53):
Oh really? OK.
Yeah, interesting. The The girl comes back Walter
White. Has his associates girl or
essentially kills his associatesgirl and then that comes back to
like I thought that was going tobe a more.
I thought that was going to cause.
Dante to turn on him, you know, he was going to figure it out
somehow, but ultimately, you know, but Dante is not that kind

(28:14):
of. Character to put the pieces
together? No, but but that just shows.
Roman starts off by justifying everything because I love my
family so much and ends up usinghis family and that's why Nevaeh
leaves and that's and and and Dante off himself because they
were, they were being used by Roman for him to get this power,
to get the upper hand, but he was doing it for them.

(28:36):
And it's like that. You're doing it.
For something. But by doing it, you're hurting
them. You know, you're doing it for
family, but by doing this, you're ripping the family apart.
And he he's, you know, between arock and a hard place.
What else can he do but try to win the game?
And it it tears this family apart.

(28:56):
And maybe the original sin, as as he writes in the book, was
covering up his mother's death. Was it?
Is this all happening? Because his father taught him
the lesson of secrets, keeping things in the family, you know,
not confronting reality. You know, we're going to sweep
this under the rug. Him and his brother and his

(29:17):
sister never talk about it. Bet that led.
To this inner fire just burning and he tries to express it
through the sexual deviance. It doesn't seem to satisfy.
It does enough. It kind of bandages him up, gets
him through it also. There's an element of him trying
to get, you know, there's a reason why he asked the

(29:39):
domination was called a Mama andbe punished like he he feels
sorry for what he did to his mom, you know?
So he wants some sort of penancethere, right?
Yeah. Yeah.
At this absolution he thinks he'll get from letting Mama be
violent to him like he was to her.
Deep stuff and dark. Stuff and not a happy ending.
I also think he. Was really driven by you know

(30:02):
that that fatherly love and. For the longest.
Time, you know, like you said, this disappearance of his mom
was this legend, and it always hung over his father like that.
Everyone thought that he did it,you know, and his father, hard
working man, made everything butdidn't get the respect put on

(30:25):
his name. And so he comes back to town
and. Now people can fear.
The Carruthers name he is. You know he is.
Making his father proud. Trying to at least.
Intense, intense. Book too, but we're like you're
right, it's not like the intensity.

(30:46):
I feel like all the sinners bleed and king of ashes both
have like the. Same level of.
Intensity, but it's like different kinds of intensity.
Whereas that one was way more, you know, like, I was just
freaked out. This one is just emotionally
intense to be a family. Family comes through.
Yeah. The family drama.

(31:07):
Is so intense, the stakes are sohigh, the characters are so.
Broken and. Fragile where all the sinners
bleed was. 1 Madman. Can make a whole community feel
that if a whole community go through this grief and here it's
just like within this family andthis family up against what

(31:30):
seems like up against the world,but you're up against.
Gangsters, you're. Really.
Yourself, physically, you're up against the gangsters trying to
survive, but what you're really trying to survive against is
your family falling apart. Yeah.
Woof. What a book?
Shall we scorecard it? Well, scorecard, it did action.

(31:52):
I think we got to go. Action Suspense.
I'm not looking. For shoot em up action in this,
which it happens a lot, there's a shoot out, there's a bomb goes
off, there's an explosion. I'm looking for the suspense of
the meet. You know when those meetings go
down, the first meeting where hewalks in and realizes, you know,
these are real Cowboys like this.

(32:12):
This is the, the, the real deal.And he went in and be able to.
Sweet talk his way. I go, I can make you money.
Yep, make a deal. Use his college boys skills and
as he's learning that's not the way it is and he learns at the
price of his teeth and his brother Spinky.
That is suspense to me. So I think I'm going 8 out of
10. That's a that's a good score.

(32:33):
I think I was going to go 8I. What's interesting is right,
this book to me, I had no idea where it was going when we're
starting off and. It it does start.
Off a little slow, you know, because I didn't, I didn't
purposely didn't read the the good reads or Amazon
description. I just wanted to go into it
knowing nothing. And when we're starting off and

(32:57):
it's like, oh, you know, his dadgets run off the road.
I thought it was going to be this whole murder mystery type
thing, you know, very similar, like what we were having to do
in. Although I guess because I was.
Used to her. I was judging it based on his
last book, All the Sinners Bleed, but then.
Really just to get. This, you know, downfall, you
know, this rise of this of this man, but ultimately his like the

(33:20):
downfall of Roman Carruthers, right?
Like was intense. But the first part of the book
is a little slow, but then it like turns a corner and it's
like a gut wrenching pace of just like we're popping
different things and everything is being put into motion and you
don't know what like what's going to happen next.

(33:41):
And so that I was on the edge ofmy seat like.
That brings me all. Back to suspense here, like I
think it's very suspenseful, like just the the, the pace of
of how the story builds and builds and builds and the
crescendos and then ends. Yeah, I don't.
Know if you could do it better with that one, that final scene,

(34:02):
not final final scene, but of essentially a final scene in the
warehouse, the final meeting, final showdown.
I don't know if you can do it better if you're talking
suspense, edge of your seat stuff and then a double twist.
And because of all that, plot tome is A10.
The story is so well crafted, everything matters.

(34:26):
Everything you learn about the characters, how it reveals
nothing, is fluff. And I.
Am just along for the ride everystep of the way, even when it's
slow in the beginning. I I the reason I'm not docking
it for that is I don't it was just slow on kind of action.
But he's not an action writer, right?
It's crime suspense novel. So it's it's not a beach read

(34:46):
summer thriller that we're used to in the mid trap Vince Flynn
kind of style. So I'm not going to dock it on
plot for that because the character building done during
that first third of the book is just phenomenal and it all pays
off. So I am giving it that time.
Wow, Big 10. Yeah.
I mean, I just don't know where I would dock it.

(35:09):
Like I don't really see anythingor or have any anything that
comes to mind where. Like there's this.
Glaring plot holes like there's it's, it's pretty buttoned up
and it's the one. Not to cut you off the 1 is when
they're strong arming the guy into giving the contract, he
strong arms the mayor pretty well.

(35:31):
But when they actually commit that crime, they tie up, they,
they, they get that guy from oneof the they, they forced him to
sign over half of his company, 51% of his company.
That was maybe the one moment where I was like.
This really your game? Plan just force a guy to sign a
document that would never actually hold up in court

(35:51):
because they can claim it was forced and under duress and
going to this whole legal proceeding like.
I just the. One thing that kind of took me
out of it, plot wiser buying wise, was when they forced that
guy to sign the contract, givingup half his company.
I would agree. With that, if if it was, they
were only trying to blackmail them for, you know,

(36:13):
prostitution, but ultimately they threatened his life, right,
They said that. So I mean, that's just how the
game is played. I also thought that the
progression of this story in thebeginning, like I'm like, is
this all taking place within a week?
But no, like it was, it was months in a week overtime.
He wasn't. Going by.

(36:34):
And you know it. It took time and it it makes
sense, right? You need time to.
Have the stocks? Make money and these pump and
dump schemes so that all that stuff wouldn't happen overnight.
Yeah, I guess that's just my one.
Like it was a little wave, the magic wand, you know, like wave
your hand, sleight of hand. Just we'll do this.
Pump and dump. I'm really good at it.

(36:56):
You sure? I don't know if you you make 5.
100,000. Overnight with that I can pump
and dump whenever I want just toget rich.
If it was that easy to just pumpand dump whenever you want to
get rich. So many of us.
Idiots would be doing that, you know, so I get it was explained
away. Like he has the connections.
He knows who's who to call. He has people who will pump up a

(37:18):
stock and then they'll sell it off.
It was just a little hand WAVY on how some of the actual
financials get done and was alsoa little hand WAVY on let's just
threaten this guy's life and then we'll we'll get him to sign
the document we needed to sign. Like that's plot armor.
You could do that at any point in any story for any reason.
Just go, I'm going to kill you, sign this thing and then they

(37:38):
sign it and you move on. See, look, I got this thing a
little plot Armory wave your hand kind of move going.
On push back a. Little bit though, because.
I think it also shows at. That point.
We see Roman like turning even more the fact that he would even
in a past in his past job, he would have figured out a way to,

(38:01):
you know, get that doing some sort of above board, above
board, you know, legal. Conversation.
You know some. Sort of coercion to to make this
guy buy into it. And, and now he's willing to
threaten some guy's life just toget, you know, his signature.

(38:22):
Like that was like pretty intense.
Yeah, I guess since. I'm I'm saying all this, I
shouldn't have gone 10 out of 10on that's.
Why? I'm going to go four and a.
Half on by and I thought the clot was crafted so well, but if
I think about that little tiny thing, that's the only thing
that loses me half a point. So yeah, I'll give you that.
It's shown Roman's turn. I will also say maybe it chose
the level of corruption the way Chauncey with the Police

(38:43):
Department is that corrupt in the end.
And the mayor, right, The mayor also has all these issues going
on. It it makes sense.
But it still rubbed me the wrongway as I read it.
So half a point, I love straight.
Up the He gets into the mayor's office and the door closes and
the mayor's like. I know why you're here, boy.
Let's just let's strike it around the Bush.

(39:05):
How much you're going to give me, I'm going to give you the
contract. That's how it works.
That's. How it works?
What you're buying? I'm a little bit lower than I'm
a four, I think because. Some of those things.
We mentioned. A little bit with the trying to,

(39:27):
I wasn't that bought in to like,I guess I needed to see a little
bit more of like his prowess as this financial advisor.
Financial. Advisor, you know, if we'd had
maybe like one or two more scenes in the beginning, but the
opening scene that did. Enough for me, yeah.
I don't know, I've just. Yeah, 4 I mean, I read this.

(39:48):
Book in two days I've been on the Kik, I've been reading an
audio book in two days that usually don't do that.
And this one I never once questioned like how much longer
is left or I am I going to just have to power through this or
when will this be over? Not once did that come into my
mind. And a couple of books we've read
recently, not the last few, but a couple back I was kind of
struggling to get through it. I would check the time, you know

(40:11):
the time stamp quite a bit to belike where we at.
This one never. I was just straight in it for
the ride. I was.
I was transported. It was funny because I.
Was checking the time, but for adifferent reason because I
didn't want it to end. Like I was like, yeah, oh wait,
there's only 10 minutes left. Like, oh, that's it.
Yeah, I'm more I. Want more?
I would spend so much time. With these characters, I still

(40:33):
think that way about blacktop wasteland.
I'd I'd go back to that trailer unit.
I'd be hanging outside the gas station with the drag racing,
like Sean has this ability to take you to these places and
make you want to stay there, even though a lot of them are
bad places with bad people. You want to be the fly on the
wall, right? Right.
Right. You mentioned.

(40:53):
Earlier about bad guys, yeah. They're good.
I think there are 5. For me.
And I'm going to throw in. Like a little bit of Rome in.
There. Yeah.
I'll, I'll go, I'll match you onthat five, especially if you do
that, especially if you do that.I do like that because.

(41:19):
Ultimately, I I think he becomesthe villain.
Like he, he, he, it's it's his reason that his entire family is
gone. So that's why the good guys.
I like Nevaeh. Jealousy was was a good
character but. Everyone is so.

(41:40):
Flawed. It's kind of hard to say like
good guys like I like Dante, like this, this super innocent,
you know, perfectly innocent bystander, like like pawn,
right? Like, ultimately you could say
that and he thinks that everything is his fault, right?
Going back to the death of his mother, because he was the one

(42:01):
who questioned. He was the one who saw adultery
and they brought it to his brother's attention.
If he'd never done that, then maybe she'd still be alive like.
You know, in this fact of trying.
To again another one who? Loved his father for.
What he did for him and you, youkind of realize that was
something through the book. I'm like why this guy is such a

(42:22):
fuck up? Like why does he love his dad so
much? But I like now you then you
realize why why he does. Yeah.
And what? Pains in.
Like why he couldn't go to the hospital, Yeah.
So what do we do for good? Guys, I can't even like.
Who are the good guys? I feel like these categories

(42:43):
don't even apply to this gritty,realistic world that that Sean
is showing. We're all flawed.
And like you said, Dante is the clearest example.
He's he's innocent, he's naive. But to the community of
Jefferson run, he's like the worst of them all.
He's always on drugs. He's trying to sell the drugs,
which gets him in this money hole.
He's caught in all these parties, all these bad

(43:05):
situations. Like he's the label, you know,
he's the one who is the label oflike drop out, you know, drunk,
drug addict, bad boy. It is just an innocent child
really deep down. So he's almost the only good guy
in the story. Even though he has all these
these flaws and bad qualities. He he doesn't want to burn, you

(43:29):
know, the Cassidy, he doesn't want to, he wants to help and
save these people. And he also has to kill that.
That one guy, Stodgy or Stodi, he's got to hit him in that
opening scene when they meet with the gangsters.
The hammer. Yeah, he comes out.
With the hammer, he doesn't evenwant to do that, you know, And

(43:52):
he still feels guilty about thatdown the road.
So he's almost the only one you can classify as.
And Nevaeh, she's, you know, she's one of the best parts of
this book because she's such a rock.
So much has been laid on her, yet she's in the dark about it,
right? You know, they're hiding so much
from her. You need that juxtaposition.
With her to like sort of balanceout the story, she's not in on

(44:14):
the secret. Yeah, you need her.
She's such a strong character. I think it brings good guys to a
fore. What if we did?
Just characters in general. 10 points like a. 10 points for.
Characters. So you would want to go 9.
Yeah, I think I'd go nine. Yeah, I, I, I agree with you.
I think, you know, throwing in all these other, you know,

(44:38):
little might like Khalil, love that character.
Yeah. And just the development of.
Each of these characters, their place in this world of Jefferson
Run, they all make sense. You, you, you know who they are.
You can identify it. So yeah, I think 9 out of 10 you
could even. Say right Roman is the worst
thing that could have had happened to Jefferson run

(45:00):
because as soon as he shows up the shit goes out of.
Control. People start dying, right?
Getty gets killed. All of these shootouts, the
gangsters. Are going after each other.
There's they they, they shoot upthe picnic.
Yeah. They blow up the vape.
Shop. All because of Roman all.
Because of him. All because of him trying to.

(45:21):
Protect his family, His secret? But his protect.
His brother, yeah. And his sister.
He's the, he's the big. Is he the big dad?
See, I think you can. Make an argument that he is.
I think you could do. Wow, even against.
Torrent and Tranquil and Dante we're walking away saying Rome
is the bad guy. He's.

(45:43):
The anti hero essentially, rightYeah, it's true.
That's. Just great storytelling.
No, it is. You can have all this Gray
matter, you know, or we just don't know who's who.
We don't know. We're questioning what's right
and what's wrong. You know, it sounds like protect
my family to the death. And, you know, OK, that's the
good side, right? But here it's like, at what
cost? At what cost?

(46:05):
Yeah, yeah. And, and at what cost to that
family that you're protecting? Wow.
Our setting. It's a little unfair for me to
do this. But do you feel?
The setting held up to what we saw in some of his other books.
That's interesting. Is it an?
Unfair question a little bit because I feel.

(46:27):
Like blacktop wasteland. That's the standard.
And. And I think all this in his
bleed, Sure. Those two.
Settings Remember the school? Remember the woods that like
describing the. Woods describing that flag
factory. Yeah.
The fish place. Yeah.

(46:50):
I don't like the description of the Crematory of these rundown,
you know, like these institutions that I can just
picture them in my mind. You know, I haven't driven
through this. Reminds me of like Petersburg,
which is like the. Sure.
Yeah, yeah. Prime.
Capital of of. Virginia South of Richmond,
Yeah. So.

(47:11):
Yeah, I could say. It's in some of those warehouses
and stuff. So just not I guess.
Measuring it up against him, it's it's like a four.
Sure. Yeah.
So we. We'll compare it just to to his
other work and it's it's, it's not a five, it's objectively.
Probably a four out of five. I think it just feels a little
bit less just because I'm comparing it, which is not fair.

(47:32):
But I think it's a four out of five.
I I do think this town, we say this all the time, you know,
like it's a fictional town. It's a fictional town.
But he makes it feel so real. Exactly.
I was just going to say, we say it all the time.
Is this real? Is it not?
Is it a character? Is it have life?
It has its own story, its own personality.
It does. It does.
So it comes alive in that matter.

(47:53):
It wasn't as much as blacktop wasteland.
Like, you could feel the heat coming off the asphalt in that
book, you know? Yeah.
What does that mean? For the cover.
His covers have been. Good so far, but I think this
one is great. I'm glad.

(48:14):
You said that because I think this covers the five five out of
five. I I might say the.
Same. And to me.
As we were getting that final description of his silhouette
against the the burning, it makes it even better.
It makes it even better. Like I'm envisioning like his
head would be right where that very dark red burning is.

(48:37):
And exactly to throw in the the railroad tracks where his mom
was last found with her car. With the car exactly.
Don't need to see it like that. Car might be hiding out there
under those bushes. Or it might you know exactly.
Why they put the the railroad tracks the tracks exactly?
And then just. Having these flames with, with

(48:57):
ashes and, you know, juxtapose because so many times they're at
the Crematory, they're burning people like the every,
everything burns, Yeah. Great theme.
It's such a motif. In the book and the cover just
encapsulates this cover. It looks good if you just see it
on a shelf. This cover is perfect once you

(49:18):
read the book, yes. The book.
You know what? That's what makes a cover A5 out
of five is when the book makes the cover better.
When the cover is already good and the book makes it better,
you have a winner. So five out of five on that.
That's. Why?
It's Judger covered by the book.That's it.
That's it. A thriller pod tagline, baby.

(49:39):
Or free space. Take it away.
What are you going to say? I think I'm going to go Khalil.
He, he was my favorite characterin the book.
Super interesting, intriguing guy.
This guy like he's at one point he's wearing like a pea coat
with this other hat. Like every time he shows up,
he's dressed in like some different outfit and he like
pops up out of nowhere, scares the shit out of Dante sometimes.

(50:00):
Like all the all the Roman quotes at one point he got he's
like, I'm sightseeing at Edgar Allan Bo's.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, house or something like that.
It's yeah, it was, it was a funny scene.
Like, yeah, he, he. Brings in a little.
Bit of Comic Relief in a book that you like you, you need a
little bit of that like every now and then just to pull you
out of this like deep dark hole of this, you know, gangster

(50:25):
network. Sure.
So I'm going, I'm taking Khalil.I love that.
I'm going to go with I'm going with the meats.
Every time there was a meet up between these guys, I just got
excited. It might have happened to one

(50:46):
too many times in the end, but every time Rome had to go face
the brothers and he had to like kind of psych himself up.
And he's sitting there saying like.
All these feelings all. Squeeziness in the stomach
suppress it. I got to got to put on a show
and he, he slowly got more comfortable doing that.
I, I think it, and I guess it's the broader point is, or the

(51:08):
broader free spaces, Rome's downfall or if you will, his his
ascendancy. It's both his downfall and his
ascendancy. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, so. All that being tied together and
that being encapsulated every time he has to actually speak
and present in front of the brothers and outplay them.
And there's a few times they think, you know, college boys
running his mouth. Let's kill him.
You're no use to me. And he gets himself out of it

(51:30):
every time. I I just think those scenes kept
the book going and were were themost thrilling and for it to
culminate in the best one of them all when his.
Guys, turn on. Torrent I just think all those
were crafted so well. They were my favorite scenes to
read and it had the the payoff that you want and it all

(51:53):
culminated in that exact scene. I enjoyed getting even better
with the twist and and and double twist being revealed
similarly. I guess you could have given it
to the twist of the flashback with the mom because it might.
That's when my jaw dropped. That would be another one.
That's when you texted me like. What A twist.
Yeah, I was like. Whoa, that was a twist.
And then I almost wanted to textyou again.

(52:13):
Whoa, that was a twist at the meet up.
But yeah, I was referring to themom finding out about the mom.
Once I got there, I figured it was.
That that was that 10 and the sister finds.
The urn, she smashes it and rageand has the the jewellery from
her mom. I was like oh so heartbreaking.
What happens to the sister so? Heartbreaking.

(52:33):
An interesting. Now, you say those meetups like
an interesting version of this book would be to turn it into
like a play, but where you. You have it just be.
A The series of meetups between between him and Rome and like
maybe him and his family, like Rome and tranquil and then Rome

(52:54):
and his family. Like it you're, you're in like 1
location. Oh, be great.
And it's, it's like the, you know, I don't know, I don't know
how you would do it. I'm not a playwright but like oh
I completely agree. I this is, you know, it's like
that movie Fences. Did you see that?
Yeah, I did. Originally created.
For stage, I think this one would work great.
With that, you go back and forthhim you, you basically have to

(53:17):
watch him meet with the gangsters, then go meet with his
family, meet with the gangsters,meet with his family and like
juggle these two worlds and the stage can be kind of split or or
turn and you right it like clearly showing you he's trying
to balance these two things and the better he gets at balancing
it, the worse it's becoming for both of them.
Right. Wow, I like that.

(53:38):
That's that's a great idea all. Right, So what does?
That what does that give us here?
M12. 3. 4545 for me, 45 1/2 for.Me, I gave it that extra half on
by him. Great buck, dude.
Woof. Sean.
Just. Always brings the action.
I just, I just think he's a talented writer doing what he's

(54:01):
meant to do. He's just a storyteller in and
out. Hope we get many more of.
These I'll be happy many more Sean essay Cosby book every
year. Absolutely, I'll read.
Anything he writes. All right, well, you.
Want to you want to take us out with something?
I think you're forgetting something this time.
Like you know what? I made a promise.

(54:22):
Every book we covered, I was going to do the Limerick.
I'm kind of proud of this one. I should have brought it up
sooner. But yeah.
They call him the king of ashes.And in trial by fire he passes.
He'll fight to the death till his family's last breath As his
demons haunt him in flashes. Oh.
That's a good 1M. Yeah, dude.

(54:44):
I was feeling it for that one. I was inspired.
That could just be like a. Like a you could just publish
that as a Limerick. Not even like as a book review
dude. There you go, I'm.
Gonna I'm gonna put all these together once this once, once we
finish and we have all of them, I'll I'll make a little put this
one on the cover. Yeah, well, that's a good.
That's a good idea. All right.

(55:04):
What? Are we?
What are we? Covering next time, like what's
what's the schedule? Oh boy.
That's a good question. Kind of flying by the seat of
her. Pants here, but Sons of Valor 4
came out. Today, yes.
And I pre. Purchased that so we can listen
to that. Supreme Justice.
By Eric Bishop Eric Bishop we I'd.

(55:26):
Love to come back to oh, have you heard about this one?
Ryan Pope POTE, debut author. His book Blood and Treasure came
out and I think it was Chris recommended it in our patron
group as our next book club book.
We'll see how many votes it gets, but I I've been seeing
that one make the rounds also published today as we record and

(55:46):
that that one also looks great so.
We've got some options here. All right, add.
It to the list so coming up in the near.
Future Sons of Valor 4 We also said we want to do some Steve
Berry with his next book, the Alexandria Link.
And getting ready. For the new Dan Brown book in

(56:07):
September, we want to at some point do a couple of Dan
Brown's. We talked about deception point
origin, angels and demons. So hopefully some mix of all
these books will be sprinkled inthroughout early August.
And then once the end of August comes, we're doing Terminal is
Dark Wolf, the TV show. So I think that's pretty much

(56:28):
our August smattering of all these books and then ultimately
the TV show. Yeah, sounds good to me.
All right, well. Before we get out of here, we
need to thank our patients, our deputy director Sherry F and
Brad E, our special agents, Adam, Mike, Ben, Darrell,
George, Matt, Don and Chris. Please subscribe rate interview

(56:50):
to No Limits the Thriller podcast.
You can find us on Twitter, on Thriller, on Thriller Podcast,
on Apple Podcast or Spotify, andas always, just at Rome be Rome.
Everything burns. Everything burns.