Flashover will be welcomed by mystery readers looking for an alternative to the police procedural and a new style of non-traditional heroine. Suzanne Chazin, who is married to a New York City firefighter, allows us to get behind the scenes of a world few of us will ever see.
The strength of Flashover comes from a strong, plausible plot, where both crime and solution are grounded in the author's thorough grasp of pyrotechnics. Fire Marshal Georgia Skeehan investigates two mysterious fires that show signs of "flashover," combustion of a room and its contents by simultaneous ignition.
Skeehan believes both deaths are connected to denial of disability coverage to fighters who fought a warehouse blaze nearly thirty years ago. She meets resistance and veiled threats when she digs through past reports. Adding to her frustration, her best friend disappears and her boyfriend arrested on suspicion.
The last chapters are worth the price of admission. Chazin takes us through an adventure scene that keeps the pages turning, building a unique venue for the final conflict. The heroine seems completely cornered but uses her own skills to rescue herself. The solution plays fair: we are surprised but not deceived when we learn the identity of the villain
For many readers, the strong plot and setting will outweigh the awkward writing and incomplete characters. Most annoying are the abundant clichés ("...a ghost of its former self..." "stopped ... in her tracks...") and far-fetched, distracting analogies.
How does it feel to have blood "crystallizing" in your veins? Or your heart as tight as a twisted dishrag? Or your stomach like a box with marbles rattling around? Or see a sky the color of a faded t-shirt? What does it mean for someone to have "a firefighter's sincerity?"
The author needs to step back and let her characters reveal themselves and their thoughts. Is it Georgia who sees Federalist columns and Beaux Arts touches on Grand Central or is the author intruding? Was Georgia an art history major in college?
Ironically, the brief chapters about "Hood" and "Bear" are written with greater sensitivity. Some supporting characters -- the boyfriend and best friend -- have more recognizable, identifying features and dialogue than the main character.
Still, the plot and setting are strong enough to outweigh the book's flaws. I'd pack Flashover for flight or beach reading. With meatier character development and a tighter writing style, the series should evolve from "very good" to "truly great."

Flashover was just the kind of book I've been looking for and find too rarely these days. It not only has vivid characters with realistic emotional struggles, it is also full of the kind of careful storytelling and forensic details that make for a great thriller.
Georgia Skeehan, a rookie fire marshal with the FDNY and a single mother, is called upon to investigate a Park Avenue apartment blaze in which a doctor is hovering near death. At first, the blaze looks like it was caused by smoking in bed. But quickly, the story takes a more sinister turn when it is revealed that the doctor once worked for the FDNY's pension board and was responsible for turning down firefighters' for line-of-duty pensions.
Ms. Chazin writes in a compelling and visual way. Her fires are the scariest scenes I've ever read in a thriller. And the relationship between Georgia and her boyfriend, Marshal Mac Marenko, constitutes one of the best on-going romantic relationships I've seen in a mystery series.
Even though firefighters and fire books seem to be everywhere these days, I really knew very little about what it's like to be a New York City firefighter-much less a female firefighter. Ms. Chazin has given me a very timely glimpse into this world, and she's done it in an exciting and compelling way.

I was looking for a good summer read when a review oh Flashover, by Suzanne Chazin, caught my eye in my local newspaper, the Philadelphia Inquirer. The book sounded so unique and interesting I went out and bought a copy. I loved it! This is a first-rate mystery with all the elements--an intriguing plot, an authentic sense of place--New York City--and most of all, realistic and sympathetic characters. Georgia Sheehan is a fantastic heroine. She's smart, tough, and yet full of human failings that make her come right off the page! I love the relationship between Georgia and Mac Marenko. The story was so exciting, I ended up reading the book in one sitting! Now, I'm going out to buy the first book in the series--The Fourth Angel.

You only need to read a page of FIREPLAY to recognize and appreciate how excellent a writer Suzanne Chazin has become. She has been impressive from the beginning --- so impressive that it is hard to believe that THE FOURTH ANGEL was a debut novel and harder still to believe that FIREPLAY is only her third. But by the time you're six pages or so into FIREPLAY, you'll realize, like the characters in the book, that there is no turning back.

Chazin skillfully accomplishes a number of things in this first chapter. Chazin puts you in the middle of a firefighting situation, standing right next to three of New York's Bravest as they walk into a mess that they did not create but that they must nonetheless contain, control and eliminate. Chazin does more than describe the scene --- she creates a sense of impending doom, with accompanying suspense; she makes the readers care about the characters within just a couple of sentences; and she brings the readers directly into a situation that they can identify with, even though the overwhelming majority of them are unfamiliar with it. However, this is not a gratuitous scene thrown in merely to hook the reader (although it does that, oh yes indeed). It sets the tone of the entire novel and has repercussions that echo on practically every page, from beginning to end.

The main hero of FIREPLAY, as with THE FOURTH ANGEL and FLASHOVER, is New York City Fire Marshal Georgia Skeehan. Skeehan is brought in to investigate the fire that takes place at the beginning of FIREPLAY, a fire that causes minimal property damage to a swank restaurant but that results in the deaths of two firefighters. It quickly becomes evident that the fire is arson and is tied to an enigmatic character named Michael McLoughlin, a.k.a. Freezer. Skeehan and her partner, Randy Carter, practically have McLoughlin dead to rights, but McLoughlin is under the protection of the FBI, which is using him to defuse an environmentalist terrorist group.

Skeehan is frustrated enough with her inability to bring in a man who was responsible for the deaths of two firefighters, but her frustration increases one hundredfold when she learns that there is a connection between McLoughlin and a fire that occurred decades ago and that took the life of her firefighter father. This knowledge makes Skeehan more determined than ever to get McLoughlin, even as she is forced to work undercover with him in order to thwart a terrorist act that the environmentalists are planning. Things become even more complicated, however, when she discovers that there is another person working with terrorists: the father of her son. And that, believe it or not, is only the beginning of the surprises that occur from the beginning to the end of this fine novel --- including one, near the end, that you'll never see coming.

There are, for whatever reasons, very few writers currently mining the area of fire investigation as a source for suspense novels. Chazin is very well on her way to making her name synonymous with this sub-genre; it is quickly becoming obvious, however, that she would be at the front of the pack no matter what area she chooses to labor in. FIREPLAY and Chazin are not to be missed.

Third in Ms. Chazin's Georgia Skeehan series, the latest installment finds this fire marshal for the FDNY resurrecting ghosts from her past, including the fire where her father was killed and the reappearance of her long-lost boyfriend, the father of her eight-year-old son Richie. But the crux of the novel centers around a fire at trendy Café Treize, that resulted in the death of two veteran firefighters and led Georgia and her partner, Randy Carter, to investigate 'Freezer', aka Michael McLaughlin, former member of the Irish gang, the Westies, and all-around extortionist.

McLaughlin is as street-wise as he is savvy, as he turns to the FBI to protect him from the FDNY, claiming to help the feds find Coyote, a ruthless member of the Green Warriors, who use terroristic acts to aid their leftist environmental causes. While Georgia's sense of justice is sometimes at odds with her duties as a fire marshal, she shows a greater maturity in this latest read than in previous novels, especially when she is asked to go undercover as Freezer's girlfriend, much to the dismay of her boyfriend and boss, Mac Marenko.

Georgia must face some difficult choices when she finds out that her ex, Rick, might be involved with the mob and seems to know the members of the Green Warriors. Could he be a suspect in a recent arson, and does she want him to meet the son he abandoned eight years ago?

Georgia, the tough but loving woman and fire marshal, gives the reader insight into the emotions involved in the valiant profession of firefighting, even as she vows to arrest McLaughlin for his horrific crimes. Always suspenseful and compelling, Ms. Chazin's novel, written with her inside knowledge of the FDNY, puts Georgia on a par with April Woo, Leslie Glass' NYPD detective in her critically acclaimed April Woo series. (thebestreviews.com)

A fire breaks out in the basement of a fancy restaurant in Manhattan and when the firemen go in, they lose sight of the entrance. When it is time for them to get out only one of the three makes it, a rookie who feels like he should have been the one that died. Fire Marshall Georgia Skeehan and her partner Randy Carter determine immediately that it was arson.

The duo learns that extortionist torch Freezer called talking about the fire and asking for money. Randy knows that Freezer is Mike McLaughlin, who doesn't care if somebody gets killed in his fires. When they go to bring him in for questioning, the FBI force them to free Freezer. He is their informant for a domestic terrorist organization called the Green Warriors and they have every hope that Michael will find out the identity of their leader so the Feds can make an arrest. Georgia isn't about to let the killer of two fireman get away with murder so she goes undercover, risking her life many times over to bring him to justice.

Suzanne Chazin captures the mood of the New York Fire Department over a year after the tragic events of 9/11. Readers will empathize even more with these brave men and women who continue to risk their lives. Knowing who the villain is only makes this thriller more interesting because it looks like he will get away with murder and the audience hopes as they read feverishly that he will just make one slip. FIREPLAY is a very hot and juicy thriller.

Harriet Klausner

Fire blazes through a Manhattan office building, killing the 50 people inside. But it's no ordinary fire.

The flames are caused by a high-temperature accelerant (HTA). The fire scorches everything in its path with over 3,000 degrees Fahreinheit worth of heat.

Enter rookie fire marshal Georgia Skeehan. Heavy politics place her at the head of the investigation, facing the wrath of her senior investigators.

Even her partner starts behaving erattically, raising suspicion among his co-workers. And the one person Georgia doesn't see coming steals her heart and betrays her trust.

Through her investigation efforts, Georgia discovers a man calling himself "The Fourth Angel" is taking credit for the massive destruction. When he shifts his focus to Georgia, she finds herself playing a deadly game of whodunit.

"The Fourth Angel" even details plans of his next deadly blaze. A blaze Georgia must decode and find the location of before 2,400 men, women and children fall prey to a fiery death.

The Fourth Angel immediately heats things up from page 1. This book does contain a lot of characters, bascially to capture the essence of the FDNY and this complicated investigation. But The Fourth Angel has plenty of action and a solid, unpredictable ending.

Suzanne Chazin's new suspense novel "The Fourth Angel" is the best page turner I've read in quite a while. As a busy mom, I usually reserve reading for evenings after the kids are tucked in. But I toted "The Fourth Angel" around with me for the three days it took me to finish it, sneaking in a few pages every chance I had.

The best part of the novel for me, is the endless twists and turns of the plot. Just when I thought I 'd "figured it out," another surprise popped up. The scientific and technological detail woven into the book makes the journey all the more riveting and real. For those of us not connected to the world of fires and firefighters, it is a revealing and frightening peak into a dangerous world.

In addition to the great fire adventure are some terrific characters. Georgia Skeehan, fire marshal, is not an instantly loveable heroine, but rather a person that grows on you as you get to know her. Her relationships with the rest of her department are not static, but develop in interesting, unpredictable ways. The flames in a budding romance are almost as hot as the fires she investigates.

Chazin's characters, her knowledge of the job and her New York City settings all make for a brilliant and thrilling climax to a novel that is bound to satisfy!

I highly reccommend this book and look forward to the next in what deserves to be a long series of suspense novels.

The Fourth Angel's first chapter is so riveting and compelling, that once you start reading this terrific new thriller, you won't be able to put it down. Rookie fire marshall, Georgia Skeehan, is put on the task force to solve an inferno that leveled a New York City skyscraper in minutes, killing fifty-four people. With unprecedented temperatures of almost 3000 degrees, nobody had a chance to escape and those caught in the building practically melted to death. Because she's a rookie and a woman, the task force basically ignores her, giving Georgia grunt work to keep her out of their way. But when she stumbles over clues that link this fire with several others and letters that prove this may be the work of a serial arsonist, the task force begins to take her more seriously and show her some respect. As evidence and bizarre details mount and point to unlikely suspects, the task force is unsure who to trust and Georgia and her team race against the clock to find the answers before the promised final catastrophe..... Suzanne Chazin has written a spectacular debut mystery/thriller that has it all...a tight, suspenseful plot, smart, tense writing, vivid scenes that come alive on the page and memorable, well-drawn characters. It is obvious that Ms Chazin has done her homework on the world of firefighting and this indepth knowledge really adds credibility to the story. This is the first of what should be a terrific series with a great heroine. The Fourth Angel is a winner and a book mystery/thriller fans shouldn't miss.