Fifty Grand

Fast paced, great characters, intriguing plot

Read ALL of McKinty's books! You can't go wrong. This is just the latest of a great list of novels by a new up-and-coming writer who will be taking the world by a storm very soon. And you can say you read him when... This is a story about a Cuban woman who sneaks into the USA to find out what happened to her father, who was killed in Colorado. The action starts early and keeps rocking. And when you're done with this, get Mckinty's Dead trilogy, featuring Michael Forsythe.

Revenge is a dish best served cold

McKinty takes one of the oldest plot devices known to man, the revenge story, and spices it up with a female Cuban police detective coming to Colorado to avenge her father's death. The characters ring true, right from the opening scenes. The novel is filled with plenty of excitement, drama and twists. McKinty's writing breaths life into this tired cliche of a plot with strong characters, good dialog and a believable, if entirely unexpected, ending. Well worth the read.

WOW!

This book blew me away. Once I started reading, that was it: I couldn't stop and I didn't want to. The main character, Mercado, a young female Cuban detective, grabs life and circumstance with both hands, and fights all-comers to solve the crime at the heart of the story. I finished the book a few weeks ago but she and the other characters are in my head still.
Highly, highly recommended.

Outstanding

One of the best female protagonists you're likely to encounter, wonderfully fleshed out characters, prose that is elegant and sharp without being self-conscious, a narration that sheds light on the parallel worlds of Cuba and America with suspense and wry humor, and then justice and vengeance, betrayal and compassion, and much more.
Best book I've read this year.

Another Eye-Opening Tour de Force from the Author of the "Dead" Trilogy

Let me tell you just how riveting this book is:

I got off a long, long flight from London to San Francisco, bone tired, found this on my doorstep (delivered right on time from Amazon) and sat down with a cup of joe to read the first chapter or so. Figured the jet-lag would take over and I'd be out before the tenth page.

Not a chance. It wasn't the coffee kept my eyes open.

Mr. McKinty, just as he has done with his three great "Dead" novels (Dead I May Well Be, The Dead Yard, and The Bloomsday Dead), pulls the reader in and will not let go until the tale is told. By the way, if you've not yet been introduced to Michael Forsythe, the narrator of the Dead Trilogy, you'll want to get these asap, as they are an epic story told by a whole new character in crime fiction.

Whether you start with the Dead Trilogy or with Fifty Grand, you don't need to read any more reviews. You don't need spoiler alerts or book-jacket blurbs. And you most certainly don't need to be hearing this story in bits and pieces from other thriller readers with faster reflexes than your own.

Just order now and read on receipt. But do begin Fifty Grand at an early hour if you need your rest.

PKL

Buy This Book Right Now

Relentless pacing, fully-realized characters, and prose that is both blunt and beautiful, Adrian McKinty has unleashed yet another great thriller. There is not a wasted scene, wasted paragraph, or wasted word in this book. It's lean, it's mean, and it's totally enthralling.

Do yourself a favor and buy this book.

I also recommend all of McKinty's other books, especially his Dead Trilogy, starting with Dead I Well May Be, a modern masterpiece. And McKinty gives new meaning to the word accessible: check out his blog at www.adrianmckinty.blogspot.com. If you comment, Adrian will respond and likely start up a conversation. Nobody's better with the craic.

This is an exhilarating thriller

On an icy isolated Colorado mountain road, an illegal immigrant is killed in a hit and run. Law enforcement gives the case nothing as the victim has no rights and was just a rodent catcher; besides which someone in the affluent town of Fairview probably killed the man who should never have been there in the first place, and no cop is going after the wealthy.

Six months later the case is tundra cold when a woman makes the dangerous trek across the border. She barely survives, but manages to reach Fairview where she obtains work as a maid. The woman is an illegal immigrant but not from Mexico and is not looking for work in the States. Though an extremely dangerous trek to get to her destination, Havana Police Detective Mercado snuck out of Cuba and through Mexico into the States obsessed with finding out who killed her father; an intellectual exile whom she had not seen in fourteen years, in a hit and run near Fairview six months ago in which the driver left him to die.

This is an exhilarating thriller from the onset when the illegal rat catcher is allowed to die and six months later when an undercover investigation by another illegal turns into a cat and mouse encounter. The story line is fast-paced with a neat final twist as Adrian McKinty provides readers with an entertaining tale driven by a strong cast especially the avenging Cuban.

Harriet Klausner

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