November 28, 2016
Bestseller Taylor’s 11th Pike Logan thriller (after 2016’s The Ghosts of War) serves as a chilling primer for an all-too-feasible terrorist strike. The leak of the confidential offshore-banking Panama Papers reveals a secret shell company financing terrorism and threatens to expose the extralegal counterterrorism organization known as the Taskforce, for which Pike works. Pike’s team must follow the money trail of a wealthy Saudi businessman’s planned succession of attacks, code-named Ring of Fire, to cripple America’s shipping industry. Taylor relies heavily on readers’ familiarity with the main characters, as their backstory is kept to a minimum, but that leaves space for intriguing secondary characters such as a Somali-American sleeper-cell drone pilot and the deadly, but principled, South African mercenary who stalks the terrorists. Pike and his crew have a few too many “just missed ’em” moments and rely on convenient technology for assistance, but the ever-escalating chaos will leave fans breathless for the next installment. Five-city author tour. Agent: John Talbot, Talbot Fortune.