Lucas Davenport and Virgil Flowers join forces on a deadly maritime case in the remarkable new novel from internationally bestselling author John Sandford.
An off-duty Coast Guardsman is fishing with his family when he calls in some suspicious behaviour from a nearby boat. It's a snazzy craft, slick and outfitted with extra horsepower, and is zipping along until it slows to pick up a surfaced diver . . . a diver who was apparently alone, without his own boat, in the middle of the ocean. None of it makes sense, and his hunch is proved right when all three Guardsmen who come out to investigate are shot and killed.
They're federal officers killed on the job, which means the case is the FBI's turf. When the FBI's investigation stalls out, they call in Lucas Davenport.
And when his case turns lethal, Davenport will need to bring in every asset he can claim, including a detective with a fundamentally criminal mind: Virgil Flowers.
'One of the great novelists of all time' Stephen King
'A series writer who reads like a breath of fresh air' Daily Mirror
'John Sandford knows all there is to know about detonating the gut-level shocks of a good thriller' New York Times Book Review
'John Sandford has the Midas touch' Huffington Post
'Delivers twists to the very last sentence' Daily Mail
'Crime writer John Sandford is one of the best around' Sun
Lucas Davenport investigates a vitriolic blog that seems to be targeting the children of U.S. politicians in the latest thriller by #1 New York Times-bestselling author John Sandford.
The daughter of a U.S. Senator is monitoring her social media presence when she finds a picture of herself on a strange blog. And there are other pictures . . . of the children of other influential Washington politicians, walking or standing outside their schools, each identified by name. Surrounding the photos are texts of vicious political rants from a motley variety of extremist groups. It's obviously alarming--there's an unstated but deadly threat here--but when the FBI is called in, there isn't much the feds can do. The anonymous photographer can't be pinned down to one location or IP address, and more importantly, at least to the paper-processing bureaucrats, no crime has actually been committed. With nowhere else to turn, influential Senators decide to call in someone who can operate outside the FBI's constraints: Lucas Davenport.
At the local state university, two feuding departments have faced off on the battleground of PC culture. Each carries their views to extremes that may seem absurd, but highly educated people of sound mind and good intentions can reasonably disagree, right?
Then someone winds up dead, and Virgil Flowers is brought in to investigate . . . and he soon comes to realise he's dealing with people who, on this one particular issue, are functionally crazy. Among this group of wildly impassioned, diametrically opposed zealots lurks a killer, and it will be up to Virgil to sort the murderer from the mere maniacs.
At first, Clayton Deese seems like your run-of-the-mill criminal - a gun for hire that keeps the boss from the cops. But after he skips bail following a job gone wrong, the U.S. Marshals see that he could be the key to the whole operation's undoing.
As marshals begin the search of Deese's place, they find something far darker than they ever expected. There are countless graves lining the back of the house, trophies from a score of killings. Deese may have seemed small-time but the evidence says otherwise - they are dealing with a frenzied and prolific serial killer.
Now Lucas Davenport must find him - after all, that's what he does best. But Deese is ruthless, has an endless network of allies and - as Davenport will come to find - he is also full of surprises
Virgil Flowers investigates a miracle--and a murder--in the wickedly entertaining new thriller from the master of 'pure reading pleasure' (Booklist)
Pinion, Minnesota: a metropolis of all of seven hundred souls, for which the word 'moribund' might have been invented. Nothing ever happened there and nothing ever would--until the mayor of sorts (campaign slogan: 'I'll Do What I Can') and a buddy come up with a scheme to put Pinion on the map. They'd heard of a place where a floating image of the Virgin Mary had turned the whole town into a shrine, attracting thousands of pilgrims. And all those pilgrims needed food, shelter, all kinds of crazy things, right? They'd all get rich! What could go wrong?
When the dead body shows up, they find out, and that's only the beginning of their troubles--and Virgil Flowers'--as they are all about to discover all too soon.
Pinion, Minnesota: a huge city of all of seven hundred folks who define the phrase 'small town'. Nothing has ever happened in Pinion and nothing ever will... until the mayor of sorts comes up with a scheme to put Pinion on the map. He's heard of a place where a floating image of the Virgin Mary turned the whole town into a shrine, attracting thousands of curious people and making the townsfolk rich overnight. Why not stage a prank in Pinion and do the same? What could go wrong? And then a dead body shows up. It turns out that lots can go wrong with a get-rich-quick scheme like this one... and lots will. It'll take everything Virgil Flowers has to put things to right - before someone else dies.
Lucas Davenport had crossed paths with her before. A rich psychopath, Taryn Grant had run successfully for the U.S. Senate, where Lucas had predicted she'd fit right in. He was also convinced that she'd been responsible for three murders, though he'd never been able to prove it. He was right. A federal marshal now, with a very wide scope of investigation, he's heard rumours that Grant has found her seat on the Senate intelligence committee, and the contacts she's made from it, to be very... useful. Pinning those rumours down was likely to be just as difficult as before, and considerably more dangerous. But they had unfinished business, he and Grant. One way or the other, he was going to see it through to the end.
Lucas Davenport confronts an old nemesis, now a powerful U.S. senator, in the thrilling new novel in the #1 New York Times-bestselling Prey series.
Lucas Davenport had crossed paths with her before.
A rich psychopath, Taryn Grant had run successfully for the U.S. Senate, where Lucas had predicted she'd fit right in. He was also convinced that she'd been responsible for three murders, though he'd never been able to prove it. Once a psychopath had gotten that kind of rush, though, he or she often needed another fix, so he figured he might be seeing her again.
He was right. A federal marshal now, with a very wide scope of investigation, he's heard rumors that Grant has found her seat on the Senate intelligence committee, and the contacts she's made from it, to be very...useful. Pinning those rumors down was likely to be just as difficult as before, and considerably more dangerous.
But they had unfinished business, he and Grant. One way or the other, he was going to see it through to the end
A few years back, Virgil investigated the corrupt - and as it turned out, homicidal - local school board in Trippton, Minnesota. Now the town's back in view with more alarming news: A woman's been found frozen in ice. There's a possibility that it might be connected to a high school class of twenty years ago, and so, Virgil begins to dig into twenty years' worth of bad blood.
Class reunions: a time for memories-good, bad, and, as Virgil Flowers is about to find out, deadly-in the thrilling new novel in the #1 New York Times-bestselling series.
Virgil knows the town of Trippton, Minnesota, a little too well. A few years back, he investigated the corrupt-and as it turned out, homicidal-local school board, and now the town's back in view with more alarming news: A woman's been found dead, frozen in a block of ice. There's a possibility that it might be connected to a high school class of twenty years ago that has a mid-winter reunion coming up, and so, wrapping his coat a little tighter, Virgil begins to dig into twenty years' worth of traumas, feuds, and bad blood. In the process, one thing becomes increasingly clear to him. It's true what they say: High school is murder.
A Biloxi, Mississippi, drug-cartel counting house gets robbed, and suitcases full of cash disappear, leaving behind five bodies, including that of a six-year-old girl. Davenport takes the case, which quickly spirals out of control, as cartel assassins compete with Davenport to find the Dixie Hicks shooters who knocked over the counting house. Things get ugly real fast, and neither the cartel killers nor the holdup men give a damn about whose lives Davenport might have saved; to them, he's just another large target.
Lucas Davenport has seen many terrible murder scenes. This is one of the worst.
In the small Minnesota town of Deephaven, an entire family has been killed. There's something about the scene that pokes at Lucas's cop instincts - it looks an awful lot like the kind of scorched-earth retribution he's seen in drug killings sometimes. But this is an up-market town, and the husband was an executive at a big bank. It just doesn't seem to fit. Until it does. And where it leads Lucas will take him into the darkest nightmare of his life.
