The Prince of Risk

December 2, 2013
The newest financial thriller from the best-selling author Reich (Rules of Betrayal) brings espionage to the New York Stock Exchange. Bewildered by a text message that was sent to him by his estranged father right before his sudden death, Bobby, head of the investment firm Comstock Partners, launches an investigation which entangles him in a conspiracy plot against an unknown U.S. target. Meanwhile, Bobby's ex-wife Alex, a supervisory special agent and head of CT-26, finds an investigation of an arms smuggler in Long Island leading her into the very same conspiracy. The story is propelled forward by short, fast-paced chapters which keep the reader's eyes glued to the page. Reich is akin to Dan Brown in that he has an everyman hero uncover an extravagant conspiracy. But unlike Brown, who weaves art history lessons into his narratives, Reich includes financial tutorials instead, which are much less interesting and harder to follow. Fortunately, the story is still enjoyable whether or not one understands the exact monetary stakes at play.

December 15, 2013
A hedge fund chief and his ex-wife, an FBI supervisory agent, work at odds to solve the murders of his father and her colleagues and prevent the meltdown of the world's capital markets to boot. Whatever malfeasance Edward Astor, chief executive of the New York Stock Exchange, and his friends, Charles Hughes, chairman of the Federal Reserve, and Treasury Secretary Martin Gelman, unearthed must have been a doozy. As they approach the White House to rouse the president from sleep and alert him to the peril, an unseen power takes control of their car and causes it to drive so recklessly that the Secret Service shoots it up, leaving them all dead. They're followed in short order by three of Astor's ex-wife Alex Forza's fellow FBI agents when the agents pursue a tip to a Queens apartment and learn the hard way that an observant neighbor did indeed see cartons of automatic weapons coming into the place. Now it's up to Astor's son Bobby, who's never been close to his father, and Alex, who hasn't been close to Bobby for years, to avenge the murders. Even though Bobby and Alex are both obsessed with their separate cases, they have no idea how closely they're intertwined. And most readers will be scratching their heads as well, wondering how a plot to ruin Bobby by manipulating the value of the Chinese yuan and cripple the New York Stock Exchange through "industrial espionage as state-sponsored covert policy" might be connected to the 30 cells of well-trained mercenaries who've sneaked into the country in a fine flourish of mayhem overkill. Have no fear. Reich (Rules of Betrayal, 2010, etc.) supplies plenty of code-named acronyms and villains, a high body count, patient explanations of arcane financial transactions and regulations, and a heroine who prays to J. Edgar Hoover. How could the exchange, the nation and the free world possibly be in better hands?

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December 15, 2013
Robert Astor, New York Stock Exchange CEO, was killed when the SUV he and two other powerful financiers were riding in lost control and careened across the White House lawn, forcing the Secret Service to open fire. Before he dies, Robert texts his son, Bobby, one word: Palantir. The text convinces Bobby (a hedge-fund mastermind) that the deaths weren't accidental, and he digs into his father's papers, struggling to decipher the threat posed by the apparently unrelated corporations Robert was researching. Meanwhile, Bobby's fund is threatened when his high-stakes gamble on the yuan's devaluation goes sideways. As he dodges an assassin, tries to save his fund, and searches for the answers Palantir holds, Bobby realizes that he's entangled in a Chinese espionage plot targeting the U.S. economy. While the detection aspects of the plot don't quite hold up, Reich skillfully anchors the story with a scarily realistic espionage premise, introduces a wealth of physical threats, and keeps it all moving at a breakneck pace. Economic espionage thrillers involving the Chinese have become a growing trend, and this one makes a solid addition to the field.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)

July 1, 2013

In Reich's latest financial thriller, the chair of the New York Stock Exchange, father of high-flying hedge fund manager Robert "Bobby" Astor, is murdered on the White House lawn. Soon, Bobby realizes that the entire U.S. financial system is slated for ruin by nasty foreigners. Note that Reich's 2002 thriller, The First Billion, has been optioned for film.

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