Audrey's Bond

Do you love financial thrillers seasoned with political skullduggery and a touch of romance? Audrey's Bonds yields a triple dose of all three. Jack McCall's Texas bank has been torched in the financial firestorm of the 1980s. His main asset is a packet of defaulted bonds of the last Russian Tsar which his dear friend, Audrey Chesley, has left him. At risk is Mack's interest in a small, Swiss-style bank in Panamá and the farm in the Shenandoah Valley that his ancestors carved out of the wilderness after the American Revolution. Audrey's bonds are worth more as wallpaper than the cold cash he needs to fend off a hostile takeover of the Panamanian bank, but Mack has inside information that they will soon be worth much more when the USSR settles the long-standing claims against them. Making that inside information pay draws him into the web of intrigue surrounding the Contra war in Nicaragua and takes him to Vienna, London and Paris, Panamá, Lima and La Paz, even to the Isla de la Luna, a tiny island in the expanse of Lake Titicaca where he cuts a deal with the head of a shady South American cabal to syndicate the bonds. ¿¿¿ McCall's taste in women barely extends past those who come for dinner and don't stay after breakfast. In Vienna, Renata Schneider keeps McCall awake at night and casts suspicion that he's a Soviet agent. In Washington and Bolivia, Angela Collins is a desperately passionate and elusive lover built for McCall's speed. In Washington and Paris, Paralee Campbell, McCall's brainy and beautiful research assistant, falls for McCall in more ways than one. ¿¿¿ Sound complicated? In the tradition of Paul Erdman (The Swiss Account) and Jeffrey Archer (False Impression), the twists and turns of this plot will keep you guessing. Fly with Jack McCall and Audrey's Bonds to a better understanding of the global financial crisis of 2007-2008.