Icarus [Paperback]

People keep dying around Jack Keller, the central character of Russell Andrews' second thriller Icarus, and he finds it difficult to be sure that it is nothing to do with him. His mother was thrown from a window by a maniac; his wife was shot on the opening night of their new restaurant; his protégé and therapist Kid fell to his death--even his mentor Dom lost an arm to the Mob for refusing to fix a fight. Jack starts investigating Kid's life and finds out more than he wants to know about the women Kid only ever referred to by aliases--the Murderess, the Mistake, the Mortician, the Destination. Kid lived in a bleak world of sexual opportunism and trade-offs, and Jack, who liked him, has to follow his trail there. For both Jack--and the policewoman whose investigation he constantly criss-crosses--the trail is one of endless legwork and painful discoveries. This is an inventive thriller about how little we really know about anyone, even those to whom we are closest. The story takes us to a vividly realized New York of high, cold places, literal and metaphorical, from which the agoraphobic Jack is perpetually tempted to take that last fall. --Roz Kaveney --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

'I defy you to figure out who dunnit, why they dunnit, or how they dunnit.' JANET EVANOVICH 'Furious, sexually-fueled, and mind-bending - a unique thriller.' William Diehl

When a burglary goes wrong on the opening night of his new restaurant, Jack Keller is left a widower and suffering from several bullet wounds. In emotional and physical turmoil he becomes a self-pitying recluse, until Kid Demeter, a young man Jack once regarded as a son and who is now a formidable physiotherapist, bullies him into better health. Then Kid is found dead, but Jack cannot accept the view that his death was either accidental or suicide. Knowing he owes Kid for getting his own life back on track, Jack starts to investigate Kid's personal life and discovers he was a serial womaniser. He begins to identify and locate these women, but every time he speaks to one of them they end up dead. Then, as he edges closer to the truth of Kid's death, he realises that his wife's murder was the catalyst of all that followed.

Russell Andrews is the pseudonym of Peter Gethers, author of 'The Cat Who Went to ...' series, and editor at large for one of New York's premiere publishing houses.