"An Unthinking Godly Curse!"

Three young teenager bodies wash up on the shores of Chandler, Massachusetts in eighteen days. If they all decayed at the same rate, it means someone is killing one teen every week and probably will continue at the same rate. Sam Harper knows that solving these murders has to be quickly accomplished but he doesn't have a single clue connecting the whys and wherefores to reach a credible, evidence-based conclusion.

A small village Mitu in southeastern Colombia, South America is home for a woman branded as a witch by her neighbors and a son who wants the ring she wears, a wide silver band encasing a black pearl with an inner inscription. For he knows that he will possess the powers of the ring's curse, power that can only pass to a natural heir of its present owner. Alejandro desperately needs this power to cement the security and revenge against a threatening drug dealer. From there anything's possible and more.

Jennifer Blake, a Chandler journalist, receives a mysterious call from a pawnshop owner. He wants her to deliver something to an anthropologist and knows she can accomplish it because she clearly has no belief in superstition and curses. That link somehow connects her in Sam Harper's mind to the unsolved murders and he's determined to ferret out the truth of the connection.

Marta Stephens has developed her crime mystery plotting and scheming to a remarkable degree! The Devil Can Wait is a tautly plotted, driven tale interweaving local revenge with an exotic tale about the twisted consequences of Vatican meddling and demonic prophecy sure to engage every true lover of superb mystery thrillers and making them want more, more, more.

Marta Stephens is a writer who deserves wider public recognition and high praise!

Reviewed by Viviane Crystal
Courtesy Crystal Reviews
Posted November 11, 2008