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Publisher's Weekly
Frey's latest pecuniary adventure follows his formula of extremely complicated plots spun around illegal, high-level financial shenanigans. He's used it with variations before (The Takeover; The Legacy; The Insider; etc.), and despite clunky writing, implausible situations, lucky coincidences and untied threads, it proves perfectly serviceable once again. Investment banker Conner Ashby is checking his e-mail while beautiful girlfriend Liz Shaw lounges nude on his bed when he accidentally intercepts an interoffice memo that refers to improprieties in an entity named Project Delphi. The wayward communication states that this company is engaged in rampant corporate fraud: "Big expense accounts, undocumented loans, and tons of in-the-money option grants. Plus, the senior guys are hiring executive assistants who look like centerfolds but can't spell their own names." Shortly after Conner receives the message, an intruder breaks into his apartment and starts shooting. Conner is out the window and on the run; Liz is dead. The plot encompasses a mysterious presidential chief of staff who is out to either save his boss or do him in, a secretary of the treasury who has cashed in big time on ill-gotten corporate shares, and quite a few women who either want to be Conner's girlfriend or want him dead. It's all very tangled, but Frey has the undeniable ability to explain complex financial transactions while at the same time providing plenty of action and nuggets of insider money lore. Those readers who like their financial fiction fast and furious will be perfectly happy as long as they don't pay too much attention to the details. (Mar.) Forecast: Advertising in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and USA Today will alert Frey's fans to his latest. They'll do the rest. Look for it on bestseller lists. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
After accidentally receiving an email detailing serious corporate fraud, Conner Ashby has an even ruder shock: his life is in danger. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
Money-melodrama in which characters join conspiracies the way they once pledged fraternities. Nobody wants to be left out-accountants, stock mavens, bankers, cabinet members. And Potus? You betcha. The feds? Goes without saying. Ordinary folk? Just ask them. If you're past the age of puberty in the sneaky old land of Frey (Silent Partner, 2003, etc.) and not in a conspiracy, it's as if you've been blackballed, shunned, and condemned to sociological skunkhood. Exception: hunky investment banker Connor Ashby. But then poor Connor's the one being done to. Consider: he leaves gloriously naked Liz in his bed, sent by her to fetch a pack of cigarettes, and returns, not 20 minutes later, to a world revamped beyond recognition. Yes, of course, blame the conspirators. For reasons best known to themselves-and, on the implausible side, to anyone else-they've done for stunning Liz and totally wrecked Connor's apartment. Connor himself gets chased by the murderous intruder, who takes potshots at him-wings him, in fact. Connor barely eluding him by slithering down the fire escape. But the conspirators have only just begun to torment. When Connor returns this time-cops in tow-it's to find order where once there'd been chaos, including a bed now entirely devoid of blood-spattered blond. Well, what's it all in aid of? And why Connor? Is it just because, in addition to being stunning in his own right, he's as smart as investment bankers ever get? Or just because he's so gosh darn upright he won't conspire unless manipulated silly? A yes nails it. The conspiracy involves multinational corporations, billions of dollars, and a prime selection of bad guys snatched from the corridors of power. But withoutConnor it's all just another small-time con. Plotting that swings from absurd to soapy, pasteboard people, and pedestrian prose: it's enough to give conspiracy a bad name.
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