I received this book for an honest review from Net Galley.

This is a well thought out book. I think the premise and some of the action is a bit hard to believe, but it is well written and is interesting. I have read other books by the author that I thought a bit better.

Another really strong effort by Perry. He is most definitely on my must read list. This story will pretty much grab you from the start and keeps you turning pages until the end. Lots of action and some good twists and turns. Good stuff.

Leah is an interesting character. Sort of a female Jack Reacher. Or going further back - a Charles Bronson character from the movies - bent on being a vigilante. The character is well written and the premise is interesting but somewhere along the way it got to be just one killing after another at breakneck speed. It just didn't seem very plausible and it felt like a video game with bad guys dropping left and right. Then the ending seemed rather rushed. Bad guys dead, ok - moving on to a few years in the future. Didn't the FBI ever wonder how all this happened? Wasn't any law enforcement the least bit inquisitive about Leah?

A good book for someone who likes a lot of action. I liked it ok but didn't love it.

A Small Town is an intriguing story about a prison breakout that almost crippled this small town until they decided to fight back. You'll be intrigued and will not be able to put this book down until the end. Some characters might be over the top but, you'll enjoy it none the less.

Love books that have more than 1 villian in it because you are debating on who the top one is. Well this book has a lot and it was interesting reading until the last chapter where it was rushed to end the book. Still would recommend and buy as gift because what I think is rushed another person may not.

I can't quite decide how to review this. I loved the beginning and the main character. The plot just seemed implausible. And quite a lot of violence.
Still, good writing.

Thomas Perry writes good books. This one is no exception! This book is about a prison break, many prisoners break out and havoc ensues in the small town near the prison. A dozen are still out there unfound, the guys that planned the prison break. A local cop is given the task of tracking them down. I don't want to give too much of the plot away, so I'll leave it at that. The characterization is well done, and it is a page turner. Very enjoyable.

The book started off well, introducing us to the residents of a small town who work at the local prison. It kept my attention through the altercation at the prison and the aftermath that left a town broken. It kept my attention through the acting police officer taking things into her own hands to help the town try to put this behind them in her non official capacity.
Where it started to lose me was after half of the criminals had been taken care of. The off the grid community just didn't feel right. The writing seemed to be too descriptive and had less action, but the part that annoyed me was the use of first and last names being used repeatedly on the same page for many of the characters. How many times did they need to be referred to by both names? It started to feel like getting paid per word and lost me faster as that kept up. I started skimming. The last few pages were a disappointment as it felt thrown together, to seal it all up. If we could give half stars, I"d give it a 2.5.
Thank you NetGalley for an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest opinion.

Distinctly different
In fact probably one of the most unique books read this year
The basic story is that Weldonville, a smallish town in America has a maximum security prison on it’s borders, it shadows the town, affords it jobs and a level of prosperity and they live in a comfortablish if not wholly trusting companionship
That is until one night, when a plan that has taken months if not years to hatch finally happens and the gates
of the prison are opened and hundreds of prisoners escape and make their way to the town
Once there they murder, rape and pillage at will and cause mayhem, the town is left bereft and sickened and will never be the same again
Fast forward on 2 years and the 12 instigators of the deed are known and are still at large
No one can find them
Leah Hawkins intends to change that and with the help from the town of funds to ‘make the town more secure’ sets out to track them down
And what follows is an in depth look at how she goes about this and what happens to the 12, it’s way more than a ‘ theres 1, bang’ kind of story as she plays the most superb game of ‘finders keepers’ looking for the most ruthless men who had done everything to avoid detection, or so they thought
Truly fascinating, well written and explained as to be intricate in detail but not alienate the reader
I loved it and the tension and excitement that was there from page 1 the author managed to keep going right through the story
Violent nasty characters pitied against Leah who to say was determined would be doing her a disservice
10/10
5 Stars

Thomas Perry knows how to write abs how to make you feel for characters. In that way, the book succeeds. The wonton violence, though. from both good and bad characters was too much.
This was too bad as in every other way, i enjoyed this book.

Thomas Perry, a highly acclaimed mystery writer, takes us to a little community in Colorado that sits in the shadow of a huge federal prison. “A Small Town” tells of a massive prison break, engineered by twelve dangerous inmates, that sets a thousand inmates loose in the little, defenseless town, resulting in the rape and/or death of many of its citizens and much property damage. Most of the participants are soon rearrested with the exception of the twelve that orchestrated the outbreak.

Vindictive city officials secretly recruit their own police Lt. Leah Hawkins, who lost a lover during the rampage, to track down the offenders and kill them. The resourceful and relentless Hawkins quickly disposes of six but the remaining felons soon figure out that they are targets and plan counterattacks from an Arkansas survivalist camp. Some critics have cited a lack of morality explanations and shallow characters as detractors from the story. I personally didn’t find that to be a big issue with Perry’s story, finding, instead, that it was well-written and suspenseful, with strong dialogue and vivid scenarios.

Great writers such as Stephen King have lauded Perry’s efforts on past works but, having never read them, I have no opinion about their quality. I can say, with Small Town, that I found it well written and don’t hesitate to recommend it.

This book started with a massive, quite violent prison break. When the twelve master minds of the break get away a small town police officer is hired as a vigilante to track them down and kill them making this book completely unrealistic! Not being a fan of vigilante justice, this was not a book I enjoyed nor one I would recommend.

I thought the story was pretty good. It was interesting. Had great potential. I liked the plot twists. Leah Hawkins is searching for the 12 escapees that wreaked havoc on July 19 th. Some of the most dangerous inmates housed at Weldonville engineered an escape plan that allowed one of the largest prison breaks. Now 2 years later, Leah goes across country searching for the 12.

Excellent, one of the best books I’ve read this year. A prison has been located in a small town in Colorado. Originally intended to be a minimum security prison,it soon houses mostly violent criminals, due to overcrowding at other prisons.

Twelve of these inmates meticulously plot an escape, and soon the small town is overrun by over a thousand escapees. They steal what they want, rape and kill, but after most of the inmates are rounded up, the masterminds are still at large.

After two years neither the police nor the FBI have any leads, so a female police lieutenant, with the secret blessing of the town leaders, sets out to find and kill them in order to bring some closure to the townspeople and justice for the slain.

I loved the amount of detail in the book. Highly recommended.

I was given an I corrected advance frog from Mysterious Press and NetGalley in return for an honest review.

A solid if not spectacular outing from a writer who seldom gets the attention he deserves.

Thomas Perry always delivers. A SMALL TOWN has a spectacular setup, followed by an engaging narrative, but unfortunately concluding with a so-so ending. It could have been great. As it is, it's just good, and that's a mild disappointment for me with an author this good.

A mass prison break creates havoc and destroys a small town. The 12 ring leaders are still free years later. The FBI has transferred resources to other more current cases. Now the town council has decided to fund a local police officer to try and hunt the 12 men down. There is plenty of suspense in this book and a lot of violence. You do have to suspend reality a bit to believe a single person could track down these men when the FBI couldn’t. Despite that I enjoyed the book. Thank you to net galley for an advanced readers copy.

Not my cup of tea, I DFNed at 30% as I found the plot a bit over my suspension of belief level and couldn't connect to the characters.
It's well written but I found the style of writing a bit too dry.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.

I received this ARC through Netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to Netgalley.com, to Grove Atlantic, and to Thomas Perry for this opportunity.

Two years after a planned prison break, twelve of the most dangerous criminals are still at large. Leah Hawkins, a local cop, goes on a sabbatical as a cover to track down the prisoners and bring them to justice. She plans to take them down one by one and show no mercy.

Unfortunately, this book just wasn't for me. It was a methodical detailing of Leah's movements and I felt like there wasn't very much character development. I was unable to feel invested in the story

Although this novel has made a few leaps of convenience for the plot, I have to say it was very entertaining.
I loved the lead character. Resourceful and patient
Basic story is that a prison full of convicts figure out how to break out of prison in an organized attack, and when they get out they head into town and create a zone of mayhem and murder. While many are caught or killed, a dozen escape. Two years go by and they are still at large. The city founders , in a bold and secret plan, send one of their own out to make things even.
It is a very entertaining story.

I was very excited to received an ARC of this book because Thomas Perry is an author I love. I've read all of his books and I know I'm always in for some fun. However, this did not impact my review. I write my reviews for possible future readers.

This book starts with a prison escape. I was getting into the story of this escape, and then........boom! It's 2 years later and a new story starts. I loved the "new " story, but it was a bit jarring to have such a sudden change. Even a chapter heading that clued us in would have helped.

Once I adjusted, I was totally involved in the way these escaped prisoners were tracked down. I love the Thomas Perry world of fake IDs, changing identities and tracking people.

As with all of his books, I loved the writing style, the story line, the imagination. I really enjoyed this book.

This is 4.5 stars which I'm rounding down. The first reason is that jarring time shift (which happens more than once). The second is the pacing, if that's the right word. There were times when a change in viewpoint took place in the middle of a chapter. A new chapter gives me a clue a change might be coming. This needed more of that. However, this being an advance cooy, this may be fixed by publication date. So after further thought, assuming this will be fixed, I'm rounding up.