Mr. Smith and the Roach

Book excerpt: John Smith has a problem. He’s a retired cop whose pension just got wiped out, and he doesn’t know why or how. Now he needs to find a roommate to help pay the bills. Sam has a problem. He’s a six-foot-tall talking cockroach and he doesn’t know who created him, or why, or how. Now he needs a place to live. Thrown together as roommates and amateur detectives, Mr. Smith and the Roach realize their problems might be related. But those problems are far more complicated than they imagined, and before all is said and done, they’ll run afoul of a Russian gangster, an imprisoned Mafia don, a crooked Wall Street banker, a mad scientist and, maybe worst of all, Mr. Smith’s baby sister. Can they get to the bottom of an unbelievable plot before someone exterminates the Roach – and Mr. Smith – for good?