GREEZERS: A Tale of Establishment's Decline and Fall

By: Simon Plaster
Publisher: Mossik Press
Publication Date: July 2020
ISBN: 978-0-9994-1855-6
Reviewed by: Amy Lignor
Review Date: August 2, 2020

Okay...I’ve said it before, I will say it again. If you have not become a fan of this author by now, you have either been locked in a closet for a really long time with no access to books, or you simply haven’t been listening to me. If it’s the first reason, I’m highly sorry for your plight and I hope you find freedom soon. If it’s the latter, then you simply make bad choices.

Yet again, Simon Plaster has penned a book that is a recipe of fantastic plot, great characters, wit, charm, and (my favorite) sarcasm. It’s also a memorable read and will have you heading back to read the rest of his great books that came before. In Greezers, we are introduced to a number of things. One happens to be a chain of auto lube shops that have been failing. Of course, their recent marketing scheme (team up with a chain of fast food fried chicken franchises and introduce a concept called “Lardo” to the public) hasn’t exactly been the best idea.

The auto lube shops are part of the empire owned by the DeGrasso family; so is the Trinita Coal & Oil Co. Now, the matriarch of this family is Nanette DeGrasso. She’s a feisty woman, to say the least, and definitely likes to rule with an iron-fist. She’s also 95, yet she seems to be able to still put people in their place when she wants to. Nanette, in her role as the all-wielding superpower of the family, is also overlord of the Oklahoma City based auto shop chain. When Nanette approved the idea for the “Lardo” sales campaign, joining up with a Ukrainian partner in order to make it happen, most of the watercooler gossip was about the fact that the matriarch may have lost her mind. People started wondering who on earth would be her successor when she finally bade farewell to Earth and headed straight into the underworld. Well, let us just say that this family has a gene pool that makes a family of dodo’s seem highly intelligent.

But someone needs to take over...eventually. Introducing Charles DeGrasso. Nanette’s son, he is the heir-apparent, so to speak, and is currently the Executive VP of the company. He’s waited for fifty years for his mother to head into the afterlife and he definitely wants to take command. His wife, Candice, by the way, is also more than sick of waiting for him to take his rightful position.

Joe DeGrasso is Nanette’s nephew. He is more than willing to pole-vault Charles and nab the reins of the company for himself. He wants the job, but he also has an ulterior motive. If he gets to be in charge, he can set up the next in line to take over which would be his own outcast son, Hunter.

Is that all, you ask? Nope. Leroy O’Rourke is a young lawyer who has his own scheme. He feels that getting “in” with Trinita and throwing himself into the race to be chosen as the next successor will lead him to one day sit where he actually wants to: the Oval Office in the White House.

Reader’s favorite, Henrietta – once a small town newspaper reporter – is, yet again, a part of this wonderful tale. She is still the same dauntless woman who is now heading toward the career of private detective. Answering a want ad she’d taken from the morning newspaper that read “Female Assistant to Private Investigator”, she walks into an odd looking building that, instead of housing the ACE Private Investigation Agency, houses Leroy O’Rourke, Esq.

Will she be hired? Will the matriarch die? Who in the family will take over? How many knives will be shoved into how many backs? Et tu, Brute? Oh, no. I will tell you none of the above. A read that pays homage in its own way to the Bard, himself, Simon Plaster has once again created a book that will have you remembering why you liked books so much in the first place...before all this technology stuff and constant pandemic news got in the way.

Quill says: This truly unique author has once again come up with even more truly unique characters you’ll love.

For more information on GREEZERS: A Tale of Establishment's Decline and Fall, please visit the author's Goodreads page at: Goodreads.SimonPlaster.com

Author Interview