Fiction, Fiction Subjects

Traitor

Name: Traitor
Author: Ralph Peters
ISBN: 9780811741682

by Ralph Peters

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Overview

A stunning terror bombing strikes a research facility in France, a much-admired African-American general is killed in a hit-and-run accident, and Pentagon staff officer John Reynolds finds an old friend--now an influential lobbyist--drunk and fearful. In short order, Reynolds must face a car bombing at his front door, his girlfriend's murder, and the wrath of a retired Green Beret general as scarred as he is inexplicably wealthy. Struggling to behave honorably--and to resist a beauty as corrupt as any human being on earth--Reynolds finds himself at the center of an international plot to sell the Pentagon the most expensive fighter aircraft in history . . . even though the weapon may not work. In an homage to the great noir fiction of Hammett, Chandler, and Cain, Ralph Peters has written the most rapid-fire, hard-hitting novel of his career--a story of Washington corruption that could have been lifted from today's headlines.

About the Author, Ralph Peters

Fox News Strategic Analyst Ralph Peters is the author of 27 books, including bestselling and prize-winning novels. He has experience in over 70 countries and, as a journalist, has covered multiple conflicts. His work has appeared in a wide range of publications and he serves on the advisory board of Armchair General magazine. He lives in Virginia.

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Editorials

From Barnes & Noble

Ralph Peters (The Devil's Garden) has it all in Traitor, an action-packed novel of collusion, corruption, and conspiracy. When plans to construct a massive fighter-bomber lead to murder, Lt. Col. John Reynolds finds himself, and those he loves, in the center of the bloody fray.

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

"I do not imagine that a one-man crusade disguised as a thriller can change much," writes career soldier turned bestselling author Peters (The War in 2020, etc.) in an afterword to his knowing, deeply involving new thriller. Maybe not, but everybody inside the Beltway who deals with (or votes on) defense budget issues should read this beautifully crafted story about a man of principle trying against all odds to do the right thing. Lt. Col. John Reynolds is "one of a legion of staff officers sweating blood to keep an underfunded Army alive." Reynolds will be faced with even more savage budget cuts if a project called NFGB (Next Generation Fighter Bomber) gets the approval for which its corporate sponsor, Macon-Bolt Industries, is lobbying so hard. Two of Reynolds's old army buddies--an African-American general and an officer turned lobbyist for Macon-Bolt--die suddenly and suspiciously. When his live-in ladyfriend, singer Tish O'Malley, is apparently killed by a car bomb, Reynolds begins to realize his own life has somehow become linked with the fate of NGFB. In addition to superb scenes of action, there are many worthy opponents here, notably a sharply sketched military madman destroying pets and works of art for dramatic effect, and a pair of ruthless French agents limited only by their own country's budgetary problems. But the real villain of this smartly effective thriller with a message is a giant military-industrial-political complex determined to suck up as much public money it can while people like Reynolds (and Peters) nip at its heel.

Kirkus Reviews

A blistering indictment of big-ticket military procurement corruption folded into a sleek, well-muscled thriller. On his way home from his old mentor Maj. Gen. Mickey Farnsworth's funeral, Lt. Col. John Reynolds stops off to see Emerson Carroll, a former friend now fattening himself at Macon-Bolt Industries. Em wants details about a devastating explosion at the aircraft research site of Macon-Colt's French competitor, but John can't tell him anything. Then suddenly Em is dead too; his impossibly beautiful girlfriend, Senate staffer Corry Nevers, is camped on John's doorstep; John's jealous lover, guitarist Tish O'Malley, returning Corry to Em's apartment, finds the place wrecked (Farnsworth's home has been more discreetly tossed); and Tish goes out to start John's car moments before a bomb turns the car into a coffin. What's going on here? John is abducted by a pair of Frenchmen who beat him, demand "the disks," and assure him that they're his only true friends. His despised former Intelligence classmate Karl Aalstrom, wangling a meeting, offers him $5 million for the disks. Ex-Gen. Roscoe ("Punchy") Hunt, Macon-Bolt's security chief, bumps the stakes up to $10 million. Even the French ante up a hundred thou. What exactly do the disks reveal about the staggeringly costly Next-Generation Fighter-Bomber (NGFB)? Why is everybody willing to pay and kill to get them? And if everybody's so eager to help John get rich, why do they keep shoving guns in his face? Following the clues dropped by all the heavies who are taking turns interrogating him, John uncovers a suitably fiendish secret about the NGFB, one that'll lead to a denouement so high in casualties it's both unintentionally comic anddeeply satisfying. Peters (The Devil's Garden, 1998, etc.) balances all this action and intrigue on a cast just big enough to keep the double-crosses spinning. The result is one of those rare thrillers that actually kills off its villains (and there are plenty) before they wear out their welcome.