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Overview
You will now feel the pain I have felt for the past ten years, Hank Tobin. You are going to know what it is like to have your son suffer for the sins of his father, which is the worst pain any man will ever know.
Hank Tobin had it all: a popular column in a New York newspaper, a Pulitzer prize, and wealth that enabled him to live his boyhood dreams. But his world is shattered when his son — himself an aspiring journalist — follows an anonymous tip to a can't-miss front-page story: the firebombing of a Brooklyn mosque. Hank's son is accused of the crime, arrested, and thrown into prison. Hank soon discovers that his son was framed by a man who has been waiting a decade to have his revenge.
Sitting in a seedy New York bar ten years earlier, Hank overheard a janitor bragging that his son torched the home of a minority family to keep the neighborhood white. Hank's story of the event made the front page. The boy spent ten years in prison and the family was destroyed — a minor event in the life of the columnist, a life-altering event for the janitor and his family.
Hank's life is in ruins. Divorced from his wife — whom he desperately wants back — and estranged by his daughter, Hank has lost his reputation, his career, and his family. To save his son from a long prison sentence, Hank must confront the vengeful man whose life he once carelessly destroyed.
Synopsis
Hank Tobin had it all: a popular column in a New York newspaper, a Pulitzer prize, and wealth that enabled him to live his boyhood dreams. But his world is shattered when his son — himself an aspiring journalist — follows an anonymous tip to a can't-miss front-page story: the firebombing of a Brooklyn mosque. Hank's son is accused of the crime, arrested, and thrown into prison. Hank soon discovers that his son was framed by a man who has been waiting a decade to have his revenge.
Sitting in a seedy New York bar ten years earlier, Hank overheard a janitor bragging that his son torched the home of a minority family to keep the neighborhood white. Hank's story of the event made the front page. The boy spent ten years in prison and the family was destroyed — a minor event in the life of the columnist, a life-altering event for the janitor and his family.
Hank's life is in ruins. Divorced from his wife — whom he desperately wants back — and estranged by his daughter, Hank has lost his reputation, his career, and his family. To save his son from a long prison sentence, Hank must confront the vengeful man whose life he once carelessly destroyed.
Publishers Weekly
There are many fine things in Hamill's latest action-packed thriller, though a credible villain isn't one of them. There's a pitch-perfect portrait of a post-9/11 New York City-including details of what it's like to be stopped and strip-searched at JFK airport; what happens when you think a letter you've just received is laced with anthrax; how close you can come to dying by taking notes when a National Guardsman says you can't; or what it's like being on the wrong Brooklyn street when a militant Jewish vigilante group rolls by. There's also a juicy picture of media high life in Manhattan, the home turf of Hamill's hero, Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper columnist and novelist Hank Tobin. The novel's only flaw is the all-knowing, all-powerful, endlessly resourceful "LL"-a vengeful father forced into drastic action by a column Tobin wrote 10 years ago that wrongfully sent his son to prison. "LL"-whose background as a janitor is unconvincingly offered to explain his instant access to everything from Tobin's private cell phone number to his newspaper health insurance-is using his superpowers to frame Hank's son, Henry Jr., a promising 22-year-old journalist, on the charge of bombing a Brooklyn mosque. Hank, separated from his retired cop wife and estranged from his family after years of boozing and related sins, strives for all kinds of redemption as Hamill's runaway train of a plot barrels along. Readers should enjoy the ride, especially the scenery. (Oct.) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.