Freezeout: A Cold Poker Gang Mystery

Cold Poker Gang #6

by Dean Wesley Smith

Sandy Hunter kissed her husband goodbye one normal morning on her way to work. She never made it. Last seen walking alone into a Las Vegas hotel room, she never came out and no sign of her remained in that room.

Her missing person’s case went cold for fourteen years until retired Las Vegas detectives Debra Pickett and Sarge Carson, members of the Cold Poker Gang, decided to investigate how a woman could vanish from a locked hotel room without a trace.

Another twisted Cold Poker Gang mystery from the prolific mind of USA Today bestselling writer Dean Wesley Smith. If you love puzzle mystery novels, grab a Cold Poker Gang mystery novel.

“…Dean Wesley Smith draws a royal straight flush by making the hand he deals readers seem possible with this exhilarating political poker thriller…”—Midwest Book Review on Dead Money

Genres: Crime

160 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 18, 2016

About the author

Pen Names
Edward Taft
Dee W. Schofield
Sandy Schofield
Kathryn Wesley

Dean Wesley Smith is the bestselling author of over ninety novels under many names and well over 100 published short stories. He has over eight million copies of his books in print and has books published in nine different countries. He has written many original novels in science fiction, fantasy, mystery, thriller, and romance as well as books for television, movies, games, and comics. He is also known for writing quality work very quickly and has written a large number of novels as a ghost writer or under house names.

With Kristine Kathryn Rusch, he is the coauthor of The Tenth Planet trilogy and The 10th Kingdom. The following is a list of novels under the Dean Wesley Smith name, plus a number of pen names that are open knowledge. Many ghost and pen name books are not on this list because he is under contractual obligations not to disclose that he wrote them. Many of Dean’s original novels are also under hidden pen names for marketing reasons.

Dean has also written books and comics for all three major comic book companies, Marvel, DC, and Dark Horse, and has done scripts for Hollywood. One movie was actually made.

Over his career he has also been an editor and publisher, first at Pulphouse Publishing, then for VB Tech Journal, then for Pocket Books.

Currently, he is writing thrillers and mystery novels under another name.

Reviews

[Gilbert Stack]

I love this series. In this book, Smith has his retired detectives tracking down what happened to a woman who disappeared without a trace from a hotel room she had no reason to be in. It's difficult to write more than that without giving spoilers but I will try. As often happens in this series, the investigation shows that that cold case that they think they are investigating is much bigger than it first appeared. What actually happened to that woman was absolutely fascinating and discovering it with the detectives was wonderful.

I was not, however, completely satisfied with the concluding chapters and resolution of the story--but the problem may be me. I began to sympathize quite strongly with the villain of the piece to the point where I wanted the villain to get away. I'm troubled by this, because the villain is committing villainy that is clearly wrong, but...if you read the novel (and you should) I think you will agree that there is some gray area in this case. I hope there is a sequel to this particular story. I would definitely like to know more.

[Quinn]

2.5 stars

Retired cops working on cold cases, who also (conveniently) have access to a very prosperous and excellent security firm, sounded interesting especially after reading The Thursday Murder Club, but sadly I didn't find the characters engaging and the writing rather stiff (also, the word "stunned" was crazy over-used).

I'm glad that Pickett and Sarge are madly in love, and I know they're in the honeymoon phase, but I don't really need to read about it in every single chapter.

The mystery itself was fairly interesting and the only reason I kept reading, but not sure if it's interesting enough to keep reading the series to see where it goes.

[Cynthia Hendricks]

Love the Cold Poker Gang mysteries

Once again the retired detectives if Las Vegas are assigned a cold case. A husband reported his wife missing 17 years ago. As they look into the case, they realize that there are more missing wives, 5 in all who have disappeared. It a great mystery.

[Yvette]

Love these books! It felt like no ending on this one though.

[Richard S Cutcher]

Good story but hard to believe

Interesting but why nobody caught on to this since so many people were involved. It's to bad that they couldn't find them and put them away

[Charl]

An enjoyable, tightly paced mystery thriller, with a totally unexpected ending.