Kirkus
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Aloysius Pendergast (9), an enormously wealthy FBI Special Agent with a go-it-alone, 007like brief, is presumed dead at sea after helping a Massachusetts friend. Gloom prevails at his fabulous mansion on New York Citys Riverside Drive (9). Preston and Child (Crimson Shore, 2015, etc.) find Pendergasts factotum extraordinaire, Proctor (8), keeping a stiff upper lip. Pendergasts beautiful ward, Constance Greene (8), is doubly depressed: her mentors apparent death was preceded by his rejection of her declaration of love. Then Proctor believes he sees Constance being kidnapped. There are clues, and Proctors emergency go-bag contains a major stash of cash, so he charters jets and pursues the kidnappers to Namibia. There the bad guys hack his SUV's computer, stranding him in the desolation of the Kalahari desert (72). As this transpires, Pendergast is being held captive at sea after being rescued by a drug-runners fishing boat. The crew decides to ransom their wily; he objects and sends the craft and crew to the bottom. Meanwhile, Proctor's protection lured away, Constance is approached by Pendergasts murderous brother, Diogenes (248), also presumed dead (volcano, not ocean). Declaring his own rehabilitation and undying true love, Diogenes takes a reluctant Constance to a paradise refuge on Floridas Halcyon Key (189). Returning to New York, Pendergast finds the mansion empty, gathers clues, and begins pursuit. Once again the plot further pushes probabilitys limits while keeping the excitement meter pegged. Those new to the Pendergast world may stumble over references to the Gsalrig Chongg monastery (80) (refuge of Constances son by Diogenes) and the machinations of Pendergast ancestor Enoch Leng (136), inventor of an immortality potion made from "cauda equinathe bundle of nerves at the base of the spine (157)," which must be harvested from the newly dead. Dialogue sometimes arrives as staged pronouncements, and theres occasional overwriting"his features slowly twisting into a horrible grimace of mirth (387)"but the fast-paced novel speeds over such potholes. Action-adventure with a macabre, sometimes fantastical flair. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.