From the author of Number One bestseller The Righteous Men. How are hundreds of unexplained deaths, spanning the globe, connected to the last great secret of the Second World War?
Tom Byrne has fallen from grace since his days as an idealistic young lawyer in New York. Now he'll work for anyone – as long as the money's right.
So when the United Nations call him in to do their dirty work, he accepts the job without hesitation. A suspected suicide bomber shot by UN security staff has turned out to be a harmless old man: Tom must placate the family and limit their claims for compensation.
In London, Tom meets the dead man’s alluring daughter, Rebecca, and learns that her father was not quite the innocent he seemed. He unravels details of a unique, hidden brotherhood, united in a mission that has spanned the world and caused hundreds of unexplained deaths.
Pursued by those ready to kill to uncover the truth, Tom has to unlock a secret that has lain buried for more than 60 years – the last great secret of the Second World War.
From Publishers Weekly
British author Bourne (the pseudonym of Jonathan Freedland) wisely eschews another foray into Da Vinci Code territory, like The Righteous Men or The Last Testament, in this solid suspense novel focused on the recent past. Former U.N. lawyer Tom Byrne gets an early morning phone call from his old boss, Henning Munchau, who wants Tom back for one more job. A guard at the U.N. building has just shot a suspected terrorist who was thought to be a suicide bomber, except it turns out that this supposed terrorist is Gerald Merton, a 77-year-old Lithuanian Holocaust survivor who as a child fought the Nazis as part of the Jewish underground. When Byrne investigates, he finds that Merton is not as innocent as he appears, and that his visit to the U.N. concerns a great secret that spans the years from the end of WWII to the present. Happily, Bourne has tightened up his writing and toned down the feverish pace and purple prose of his earlier work. (Dec.) (c) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
Despite his thorough disenchantment with the law and the UN, former human-rights attorney Tom Bryne agrees to return to his former workplace to handle some damage control. Headquarters security has killed an elderly British tourist, Gerald Merton, and with the UN already in the spotlight because of the arrival of a new Secretary General, officials want a quick, quiet resolution. The question on everyone’s mind: Was the victim a terrorist, or was it all a horrible mistake? It doesn’t take long for Tom to figure out that finding the answer won’t be easy: a Holocaust survivor, Merton kept shocking secrets about himself and the Nazis that some very powerful men don’t want exposed. Bourne (pseudonym for an award-winning British journalist) brings some lesser-known history into focus here, integrating brutal descriptions of Nazi terror into his modern-day thriller. If his plotting runs somewhat amok, his prose is sharp and clear, especially when he’s dealing with history. It’s also no stretch to imagine some readers diving for the history books or the Internet to find out more about the real endeavors that fueled the fictional Gerald Merton’s life. --Stephanie Zvirin
Description:
From the author of Number One bestseller The Righteous Men. How are hundreds of unexplained deaths, spanning the globe, connected to the last great secret of the Second World War?
Tom Byrne has fallen from grace since his days as an idealistic young lawyer in New York. Now he'll work for anyone – as long as the money's right.
So when the United Nations call him in to do their dirty work, he accepts the job without hesitation. A suspected suicide bomber shot by UN security staff has turned out to be a harmless old man: Tom must placate the family and limit their claims for compensation.
In London, Tom meets the dead man’s alluring daughter, Rebecca, and learns that her father was not quite the innocent he seemed. He unravels details of a unique, hidden brotherhood, united in a mission that has spanned the world and caused hundreds of unexplained deaths.
Pursued by those ready to kill to uncover the truth, Tom has to unlock a secret that has lain buried for more than 60 years – the last great secret of the Second World War.
From Publishers Weekly
British author Bourne (the pseudonym of Jonathan Freedland) wisely eschews another foray into Da Vinci Code territory, like The Righteous Men or The Last Testament, in this solid suspense novel focused on the recent past. Former U.N. lawyer Tom Byrne gets an early morning phone call from his old boss, Henning Munchau, who wants Tom back for one more job. A guard at the U.N. building has just shot a suspected terrorist who was thought to be a suicide bomber, except it turns out that this supposed terrorist is Gerald Merton, a 77-year-old Lithuanian Holocaust survivor who as a child fought the Nazis as part of the Jewish underground. When Byrne investigates, he finds that Merton is not as innocent as he appears, and that his visit to the U.N. concerns a great secret that spans the years from the end of WWII to the present. Happily, Bourne has tightened up his writing and toned down the feverish pace and purple prose of his earlier work. (Dec.) (c)
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
Despite his thorough disenchantment with the law and the UN, former human-rights attorney Tom Bryne agrees to return to his former workplace to handle some damage control. Headquarters security has killed an elderly British tourist, Gerald Merton, and with the UN already in the spotlight because of the arrival of a new Secretary General, officials want a quick, quiet resolution. The question on everyone’s mind: Was the victim a terrorist, or was it all a horrible mistake? It doesn’t take long for Tom to figure out that finding the answer won’t be easy: a Holocaust survivor, Merton kept shocking secrets about himself and the Nazis that some very powerful men don’t want exposed. Bourne (pseudonym for an award-winning British journalist) brings some lesser-known history into focus here, integrating brutal descriptions of Nazi terror into his modern-day thriller. If his plotting runs somewhat amok, his prose is sharp and clear, especially when he’s dealing with history. It’s also no stretch to imagine some readers diving for the history books or the Internet to find out more about the real endeavors that fueled the fictional Gerald Merton’s life. --Stephanie Zvirin