Aug 25, 2021
I love the story premise gives me a grand theft auto/cop craft premise, both which I did personally enjoy. The storytelling in this first chapter was well done. With the exception of Pierce not wanting to kill; in my perspective, which I admit could be corrupted from too much GTA, if someone went after my boss's life and I was his enforcer, I wouldn't hesitate to kill them, I enjoyed the reading start to finish.
I know the expectation for a lot of stories in this genre is to get into the action right away, but I feel rushing into the action isn't always the ideal choice. I am the type of reader who likes to know the why before engaging in a heavy fight to the death kind of clash. I feel like this was the dessert before dinner.
What would have made this excellent chapter even more compelling is knowing how Lev came to know his friend was missing and the struggle he went through to get to the initial point of checking the casino to search for the informant. I can imagine the process of not knowing anything to finally finding the crucial that leads to his friend with your gift for dramatics to be as exhilarating as this chapter was, though I'm sure your subsequent chapters will cover this.
I also echo Pearlyn's sentiments about wanting your gift for my own writing because I am nowhere near as strong in that category :)