This was a hard choice between a 1 or 2 star for me. Southern Greed is about a woman who falls for a con man and a series of mysteries and plot twists unfold. It doesn't sound bad, it sounds really good. Unfortunately, sounding and being aren't the same thing.
In this book, I felt like all the pieces were there. The reason two stars won out is because of those pieces. There is so much potential here for a great story, but it is at it's absolute raw form. The main woman, whose actual name is part of the plot twists so I won't give it away, is an unreliable narrator in every sense. I would strongly suspect her of having a mental illness from repressed trauma. I'm not saying that to be mean. There are beautiful pieces of literature that have characters struggling with internal trauma. However, I can't tell if the author means for her to or not. If not, her character is naive and nearly delusional to the point of being ridiculous. If she is supposed to have an issue with trauma, it needs to be more clear. Let the reader see her unreliability, so they can understand the story around her. Don't make the reader stretch their mind so far as to believe she is fully sane.
I think plot twists you don't see coming are great. However, as shocking as they are, there HAS to be some foundation for it to be plausible within the realm of the story. Some of the twists just weren't backed up well.
This book needs heavy, heavy, heavy revision. But I do think something is there for it. It could potentially be a great historical suspense; I really can see that. It just needs extreme amounts of time and work done to it. Shaky 2/5 stars.