Reviewed by Alex Ndirangu for Readers' Favorite

Cleveland, November 1971. A few months short of his retirement goal, Lieutenant Alex Wesner takes on a case involving a missing steel worker. Anton Wojcik reported for work at Rubicon Steel for his night shift at the blast furnace but never clocked out the next morning. After Lt. Wesner interrogates Seazy, Anton's work partner, on the night of the disappearance and gets nothing, he thinks there may be no case at all―except there is. Things become even stranger with the revelation that someone at Rubicon Steel pulled the internal security at the company from looking into Anton's disappearance. Rubicon only called the authorities because the police couldn't enter the mill without an escort. Worse yet, when other detectives join Lt. Wesner to meet with a secret informant, they find him badly attacked and left for dead. Could there be a mole in Lt. Wesner's team? How did Anton disappear without a trace? Could he have fallen—or was he pushed—into the molten steel, or did he choose to leave without notice? Get yourself a copy of Robert Allen Stowe's The Fires of Rubicon to find out.

Robert Allen Stowe describes the setting so that it evokes powerful images in your mind and induces strong emotions. The narrator's voice in the omniscient third person chronologically recounts past events through foreshadowing and even predicts the fate of the book's cast. The characters are exceptionally developed, and everyone will find their favorites. By the first few minutes of reading, I cared about Seazy. The moments of soliloquy when he was thinking things over made it very easy for me to relate to his fears and vulnerabilities. Yes, I did weep several times over how unfairly life treated him right from a young age, but Stowe's sensitive handling of the subject matter is one of the major factors that made this story a winner. The author skillfully blended mystery, tension, and plausible action to deliver this novel. You won't want to waste time playing the "whodunnit" game here since Stowe so masterfully manipulates the turn of events. The ending will surprise you. The Fires of Rubicon is one of the best books I've read this year. I devoured it in just a single day, longing for the next set of revelations and eager to learn the true identities of the villains. If you love historical fiction and gripping investigative thrillers, check out this page-turner. It's a real treat!