Featured on The Book Show on Sky Arts on 10 November 2011.

Shortlisted for the Galaxy Crime & Thriller of the Year Award 2011.

Robert Harris' latest book is gripping, compelling and unsettlingly a little too close to the truth. Set entirely over the course of a single day, The Fear Index follows the genius owner of an incredibly successful, computer controlled, hedge fund in his quest to find out who is trying to destroy him, even as the world's financial markets head for collapse. Well worth getting in hardback, fans won't be disappointed.

Comparison: Alex Scarrow, Tom Bradby, Michael Dobbs
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Synopsis

Dr Alex Hoffman is a legend. An American physicist once employed on the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland, he now uses a revolutionary and highly secret system of computer algorithms to trade on the world's financial markets. None of his rivals is sure how he does it, but somehow Hoffman's hedge fund - built around the standard measure of market volatility: the VIX or 'Fear Index' - generates astonishing returns for his investors. Then, late one night, in his house beside Lake Geneva, an intruder disturbs Hoffman and his wife while they are asleep. This terrifying moment is the start of Robert Harris' new novel - a story just as compelling and timely as his most recent contemporary thriller, The Ghost

About the Author

Robert Harris is the author Fatherland, Enigma, Archangel, Pompeii and Imperium – all of which were worldwide bestsellers. His work has been translated into thirty-three languages. He was born in Nottingham in 1957 and is a graduate of Cambridge University. He worked as a reporter on the BBC’s Newsnight and Panorama programmes, before becoming Political Editor of the Observer in 1987, and then a columnist on the Sunday Times and the Daily Telegraph. In 2003 he was named Columnist of the Year in the British Press Awards. He lives near Hungerford in Berkshire with his wife and their four children. More books by this author Author 'Like for Like' recommendation