Total Immunity

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Smart, tough Los Angeles FBI agents Jack Harper and Oscar Hidalgo meet their match in a diamond smuggler, Steinbach, who seems to have almost superhuman powers. Arrested during a clever sting operation, Steinbach tells the team of agents he will kill them, and sure enough, one by one, they start to die. Worse, Jack can’t begin to pin it on Steinbach, who is, after all, in prison. Soon, however, Steinbach makes a deal with Homeland Security and is freed with total immunity.Jack is pretty sure that he and Oscar could be next. But, as it turns out, Steinbach is not the only menace. Two of the agents who were killed turn out to be dirty. Jack and Oscar tour the seamy side of L.A. in hopes of finding clues, but they get way more than they bargained for.(20090615)From Publishers WeeklyIn Ward's overblown crime novel, two Los Angeles FBI agents, Jack Harper and Oscar Hidalgo, are thrilled when their successful sting brings down South African jewel smuggler Karl Steinbach. They laugh off Steinbach's promise that everyone involved will soon die, but when a fellow agent's brakes fail and another is pushed in front of an oncoming train, Harper and Hidalgo fear they might be next. As the pair investigate their slain comrades' lives, they discover that what looked like a case of retribution is actually tied to a web of deceit that stretches to the highest echelons of the FBI. Ward (Four Kinds of Rain) mixes in a melodramatic subplot involving Harper's young son, Kevin, whose attempts at teenage rebellion coincidentally put him in the center of his father's investigation. A former writer for Miami Vice, Ward weighs down what could have been a slick tale of greed and corruption with hollow heroes and stereotypical villains. (July) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistLos Angeles FBI agents Jack Harper and Oscar Hidalgo breathe sighs of relief after the arrest of South African jewel smuggler Karl Steinbach in a complex sting. Alas, their satisfaction is short-lived. Mere moments after Steinbach is locked up, he strikes a deal with Homeland Security, acquiring freedom—and total immunity—in exchange for information about Muslim terrorists. Liberation is not enough for the vengeful Steinbach, who threatens to kill Harper, Hidalgo, and anyone else who betrayed him. Soon two fellow agents are dead—one in a harrowing car crash, the other thrown in the path of an oncoming train. (But were they just innocent victims or fallen players in Steinbach’s scheme?) Agent Harper wrangles with the demons of past cases as he and Hidalgo furiously pursue clues, certain that one of them is next on Steinbach’s list. In this cinematic (if occasionally over-the-top) thriller, veteran TV writer and producer Ward (Four Kinds of Rain, 2006) serves up a story line crackling with action and a cool cast of thugs, traitors, killers, and creeps. --Allison Block