Get ready for the ride of your life!

Kickback, the new novel by P.M. Terrell, is a fascinating page-turner. The prologue starts with Sheila, the main character hanging- upside down in her Toyota Tercel. Then chapter one starts at the beginning with Sheila starting a new job as a computer programmer. She is asked to come up with not one program, but two. The first to show the actual cost of goods delivered with the usual information such as goods delivered, when, where, by whom, etc. The second program was to overwrite the first one showing the kickback. Was this illegal? Would the FBI jail her for this? And who were Sheila's actual bosses anyway? Were they mob members or just typical greedy tycoons?

Sheila came from a small town, both parents are dead and her only living relative is an aunt she doesn't always get along with. She doesn't have a whole lot of friends and not much to leave behind to accept this job in Washington, D. C. But when things get deep and her aunt's farm is threatened to be demolished for a new road, she does all she can to save it.

Then she finds out her aunt is kidnapped and won't be returned unless she finishes these new programs. Can she trust her aunt's kidnappers, and how do they know anything about her writing these programs? Apparently her bosses, whoever they are, have longer arms than she thought. Meanwhile she meets Matt, who works in a law office. Can she trust him? Can she explain her predicament to his law firm without getting into trouble? Is the furniture he bought for her bugged?

When Sheila is asked to find proof of these illegal kickbacks, she finds more than she ever thought possible. The trucking industry is involved, AAFES (Army and Air Force Exchange Service), a large tobacco company and a big wine manufacturer. Can it be Sheila, a simple college graduate that helps the FBI prove the who, what, and how of these kickback schemes? She not only uses her computer knowledge to write the illegal program, but also leaves trails of all her work so that there is evidence left behind in case she doesn't make it out of this mess alive. When she investigates what happened to the company's previous programmer, she knows it's very likely not to make it out.

Then there is Pam, her supervisor. Why is she so interested in how Sheila is doing on the programs? Does she really want Sheila to finish them? Sheila has a hard time figuring out which side Pam is on-when she finds out, she's shocked. Then semi trucks-one of the biggest industries in the kickback scheme, kill Pam. Will Sheila be next?

This is a fun to read, hard to put down novel comparable to Mary Higgins Clark and John Grisham novels. Well worth reading. Readers will be looking for more from Terrell.

P.M. Terrell has been in the computer industry since the mid-seventies and has written several nonfiction books. This is her first novel.

---Review by Michelle Connell