STARRED Book Review: No Good Deed

Reviewed by Peggy Kurkowski | Content warning(s): Sex trafficking

One man’s act of kindness triggers an explosive sequence of events that threatens everything and everyone he loves.

Inspired by true events, Wallace’s impressive sophomore novel No Good Deed examines the seedy criminal underworld of sex trafficking in the American South. It’s a compulsive story of everyday people selflessly sacrificing to help those in need among us. 

Christopher Jones is a divorced father working two jobs to make ends meet in Nashville, Tennessee, when his headlights shine across the huddled frame of a young Korean woman in a darkened business doorway along his morning newspaper route. Offering her a ride, he soon realizes that the woman, Kim, is running from trouble. Big trouble. Little does he know his “one good deed” to help a stranger will soon ripple into concentric rings of violence for himself, Kim, and those they care about.

Wallace thoughtfully transitions between Christopher’s and Kim’s backstories—both marked by loss, betrayal, loneliness, but also a stubborn hope for a better future. Kim’s story is particularly heartrending, and it is sensitively told by Wallace who displays his apparent dedication to accuracy on the subject. 

We learn that Kim envisioned a different life in America after leaving her poor South Korean village at the age of sixteen to find work and an education. Instead, the male villager who offered her passage sold her into sex slavery at a string of massage parlors run by the ruthless “Boseu,”—real name Cho Lee, an ex-South Korean Army veteran aided by enforcers.

With nothing but the spare clothes on her back, the now twenty-year-old Kim does not possess her travel visa. It’s locked away in the basement prison she just fled from. Realizing she cannot purchase a bus ticket to get her to her original destination in San Francisco, Christopher provides Kim safe shelter at his home while they work through viable solutions. He sees the “fear, despair, and grief in her eyes, but also…a glimmer of hope, a longing for a different life.”

When a call to the Nashville Police Department proves unhelpful unless Kim can stick her neck out further against Cho Lee with little hope of escaping an unfair prostitution arrest, a difficult situation becomes almost impossible: Cho Lee has the information he needs to hunt down Christopher, his family, and anyone else who stands in the way of retrieving Kim. When Cho Lee’s goons stage a surprise break-in at his house, their brutal act of violence unleashes a new and righteously angry side of Christopher, who seeks his own payback. 

Wallace’s pacing is pitch perfect as Christopher begins to take back his power in protecting Kim from Cho Lee’s sadism. He reluctantly enlists the help of his security services guru and one-time best friend, Bert, who is now married to Christopher’s ex-wife. The thrills are explosive and the cat-and-mouse game increasingly personal. 

Also joining this unlikely band of freedom fighters is a former preacher’s wife turned activist, Gloria Jean McNulty, who runs a “stripper ministry” to help women find a way out of stripping and prostitution. Christopher is drawn to her simple faith in God and her guts to help get Kim to safety, no matter the danger. Wallace’s characters are finely drawn, believable, and eminently likable (except for the bad guys, of course). Even these are given time and attention by Wallace, much to the reader’s benefit. 

In five short days, Christopher, Kim, and their allies must make choices and take actions with lasting consequences each must wrestle with. In this, Wallace effectively teases out the moral complexities of fighting fire with fire. His protagonists are good people facing unspeakable brutality and evil; they are ordinary people thrust into becoming the heroes they never knew they were. 

No Good Deed is a superbly written and propulsive story with an unforgettable climax, a novel with a soul that entertains as it educates about sex trafficking and the individuals sucked into its diabolical orbit. Do not miss this one.

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