The Directive: A Novel

by Matthew Quirk

Overview

A pulse-pounding thriller about two brothers, billions of dollars, and the heist of a lifetime by the author of the national bestseller The 500.

After escaping the corrupt back rooms of Washington, DC, Mike Ford is again playing a dangerous game — and this time the stakes are even higher. Mike's brother is in over his head in a powerful conspiracy to steal a secret worth billions from the rarely understood, vitally important trading desk at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

Trying to bail his brother out, Mike quickly finds himself playing a dangerous game, trapped into planning the heist himself, forced to call on all the skills of his criminal past in order to escape. In this sharp, fast-paced sequel to The 500, Mike Ford again stars as the cunning and courageous former con man with a big heart, and Matthew Quirk confirms that he is one of the most exciting thriller writers at work today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316198639
Publisher:	Little, Brown and Company
Publication date:	03/10/2015
Series:	Mike Ford , #2
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	384
Sales rank:	66,081
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.40(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Matthew Quirk studied history and literature at Harvard College. After graduation, he spent five years at The Atlantic, reporting on a variety of subjects, including crime, private military contractors, the opium trade, terrorism prosecutions, and international gangs. He lives in San Diego.

Editorial Reviews

Praise for THE 500:

"Gripping...the action never lets up for a second, and the pages cannot be turned fast enough."
—Associated Press


"This ripping yarn springs and snaps along like a row of wolf traps."
—Newsday

"Quirk is such an expert in escalation that, like a frog in a pot of boiling water, you'll be done before you even realize it."—Entertainment Weekly

From the Publisher

03/10/2014
Washington, D.C., political fixer Mike Ford wouldn’t flinch at a .45 to the temple, but as his wedding to the woman of his dreams, fellow lawyer Annie Clark, approaches, he begins to freak out, in Quirk’s fast-paced sequel to The 500. And that’s even before some mysterious heavies threaten to kill Annie unless Mike helps them pull off a risky high-tech heist involving breaching the security of the New York Federal Reserve. In addition, Mike discovers that his partner in crime—ostensibly also strong-armed—will be his long-estranged brother, Jack, an inveterate con man who embodies the toxic past that Mike has struggled so hard to put behind him. Quirk keeps the action credible, from Beltway backstory to the white-knuckle caper at the New York Fed, but all the triple-crosses can’t conceal the fact that most of the characters serve as little more than action figures in a game whose biggest surprise many readers will guess in advance. Agent: Shawn Coyne, Endeavor Agency. (May)

Publishers Weekly

Mike Ford is looking to the future, but his past keeps dragging him back. Listeners can hear that conflict in the versatile voice of narrator Jay Snyder as Ford, an attorney who is set to marry his monied fiancée, gets pulled into a daring heist to save his brother, Jack, a con man. Mike spends most of the production seeking a safe way out of this impossible job, which is stealing a market-influencing document from the Federal Reserve Bank. In addition to Mike's wise-guy cadence, Snyder creates distinctive voices for all the main characters whether they’re forces for good, bad, or something in between. His performance captures the energy of this breakneck thriller. D.E.M. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

JULY 2014 - AudioFile

2014-05-07
A young Washington, D.C., attorney who inherited his con man father's skills and love of risk is forced under pain of death to steal trading secrets worth billions from the Federal Reserve Bank.Mike Ford may be a Harvard Law graduate, but he never learns. In Quirk's previous novel, The 500 (2012), he got in murderously over his head spying on influential congressmen for a life-altering payday. In this new book, a brutal schemer threatens to kill Mike and his brother, Jack, a chronic screw-up on the verge of landing in prison like their old man, unless Mike breaks into the D.C. office that issues billion-dollar trading directives to the Fed. When, on the eve of his engagement party, Mike starts offering phony excuses for his sudden disappearances, he angers his fiancee, Annie, one of the spoils of The 500. Her snooty British father, who runs a shadowy hedge fund, has never liked him. Pulling stunts like bursting into a social gathering and threatening a man with a knife doesn't smooth tensions with her. After enduring grueling torture, Mike applies his considerable skills to the heist, including picking supposedly impenetrable locks, cracking security systems and setting up his own surveillance. He also sets traps for the bad guys—for whom, he increasingly suspects, Jack is working. There's enough action for three thrillers and plenty of twists and turns. But the shaky plot, which revolves around Mike's trust-him, don't-trust-him feelings toward his brother, quickly becomes tiresome. Mike's cardboard personality ensures that the book will fail to involve the reader more than superficially.A fast-paced but emotionally empty follow-up to The 500.

Kirkus Reviews