Michael Sears (Mortal Bonds) left a lucrative career on Wall Street to write thrillers. As it turns out, he has a golden touch with words. In Long Way Down, the third in his series featuring former trader Jason Stafford, Jason is nicely set up with a "seven figure job for life" working for banker Virgil Becker, whose father's Ponzi scheme nearly sank the family business until Jason salvaged it. Virgil asks Jason to investigate an SEC insider trading charge against Philip Haley, the CEO of a breakthrough biofuel company in which Virgil's boutique bank holds a large position. Having served two years in prison for his own firm's "financial irregularities," Jason knows where the bodies are buried.
He soon finds himself meeting tycoons in back seats of limos and on terraces of Long Island estates complete with "the Times spread over glass-topped tables, the scent of fresh-brewed Zabar's coffee, and a bag of jelly-filled croissants from the Montauk Bake Shoppe." Jason uncovers fraudulent trading accounts, marital spite, bottom-feeding investor sharks and enough thievery to send him on the run from thugs hired by any number of potential suspects who want his investigation ended.
What sets Sears's novels apart is Jason's relationship with his six-year-old autistic son referred to only as "The Kid." Sears's articulation of the challenge in raising a child with autism reads as true as his Wall Street jargon. With a compelling plot and the authenticity of Jason's professional and personal worlds, Long Way Down is a solid reader investment. --Bruce Jacobs, founding partner, Watermark Books & Cafe, Wichita, Kan.