Book Review: Slip & Fall by Nick Santora

I am a total Prison Break junkie. It is fast-paced, intelligent, and, well, you can’t deny that Wentworth Miller is extremely attractive. I also love to curl up on a rainy night with a good thriller of a novel.

So, when I heard that co-executive producer and writer of Prison Break, Nick Santora (he also boasts writing credits on The Sopranos, Law & Order, and The Guardian), was publishing his first book, I was intrigued.

Slip & Fall follows Bensonhurst, Brooklyn-born and -raised attorney Robert Principe. He is a good Italian boy who loves his family, has a gorgeous wife, came back to the neighborhood to open his law practice and, of course, has family members who are affiliated with the mob.

With his practice failing, his wife pregnant, and bill collectors hounding him, he goes against everything that he stands for and hatches an absolutely bound to fail insurance scheme with his thug cousin who is just a very little fish in the very big pond that is the Brooklyn mob. Predictably, things get out of hand very fast and Robert finds himself scrambling to save not only his license to practice law, but his life.

For a first-time novel writer, Santora takes what he knows from the pacing of television and translates it ever so well. Slip & Fall moves along fast, keeping you on the edge of your seat. The main character is likeable and his problems are more than believable, but for a man who claims to be as honest as they come, he surely jumps to the wrong side of the law too quickly to be realistic.

The biggest problem though, is Santora’s use of the “dun dun dun” moment. If you are unfamiliar, that is the scene in a television show, just before a commercial, when one character gives another an ominous look accompanied by sinister music. It is the telltale sign that something bad is going to happen. In his attempt to build suspense, Santora overuses this tactic, ending entirely too many chapters with his main character saying something like, “Because what I did was horrible,” or “As bad choices went, I was just warming up.” I got it after the first time. Something terrible was going to happen. Hopefully before his next effort the author will learn that in novels you do not have to usher your audience along quite so forcibly.

Overall, Slip & Fall is a fun and exciting read and an admirable effort from a fledgling writer. With so much on his plate, I hope that Nick Santora will continue keeping my favorite television show fresh and start work on his next interesting thriller. 

Article Author: Kate C. Harding

Kate Harding's brain contains an abnormal amount of entertainment (read: useless) knowledge. It is the reason that she did not do better in school and why she often can't remember why she walked into a room. …

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