Bøker av L. A. Starks

Murder disrupts a billion-dollar oil deal STRIKE PRICE is a story about a business deal turned deadly, concluding with a plot to destroy a hidden, crucial US oil center and bring the US into confrontation with another global power. To stop the plot and save lives, up-by-the-bootstraps Lynn Dayton must trust a Cherokee elder who carries a corrosive secret. Exclusively in the print edition, STRIKE PRICE features authentic Cherokee syllabary text in clues that tie fascinating Native American history to global high-stakes drama today. "If you're looking for big business wheeling-and dealing, international intrigue, murder, mayhem and high-geared action, you've come to the right place. Toss in a charming and nervy protagonist like Lynn Dayton and L.A. Starks' STRIKE PRICE is right on the money. Well-written, well-plotted and well worth a reader's time..." Carlton Stowers - - - two-time Edgar winner "STRIKE PRICE takes the reader from Oklahoma Indian reservations to the streets of Florence, in an imaginative and well informed fusion of oil refining economics, Native American politics, and the potential for lethal mayhem in the global energy market." Michael Ennis - - - author of New York Times bestseller, The Malice of Fortune "Plan on not sleeping tonight." James Gary Vineyard - - - author of The Grave On Peckerwood Hill "Fast-paced and convincingly choreographed, Starks' novel presents a spot-on depiction of today's oil business that grips and scares and offers the reader plenty to think about." Richard Holcroft - - - author of Patriot's Blood Summary: When several people involved in bidding for an oil refinery are murdered, the situation becomes far more than a billion-dollar business deal. A self-made woman in the oil industry, Lynn Dayton fights to save lives when escalating attacks reveal a hired assassin's plan to disrupt oil trade, wreck world economies, and draw another global power into dangerous confrontation with the United States. Are the killers rogue civil servants challenging the Cherokees' financial independence, Sansei operatives again wreaking violence, or sinister investors swapping the bidding war for a real one? Lynn Dayton and Cherokee tribal executive Jesse Drum must learn to trust each other so they can find and stop the killers. Can sobering up really be fatal? How have so many of the deaths been made to appear accidental? Who's creating weapons with modern poisons and ancient Cherokee arts?

(Dedicated to the 300th anniversary of the city of New Orleans.)TriCoast Energy executive Lynn Dayton is visiting the company's San Francisco refinery when it comes under attack. Saddened by the fiery deaths of several workers, she traces the explosion to software malfunctions and contacts cybersecurity chief Kanak Singh to track it back to the source. The second law refers to the second law of thermodynamics: it means that in an isolated system everything tends towards chaos.Lynn is still reeling when a TriCoast lease bidding manager is killed in New Orleans. The seeming motive is the theft of his computer containing billion-dollar secret offshore bid plans. Then her long-time mentor and good friend is gunned down in front of her in a Louisiana swamp. What terrible plan lies behind all these crimes? Lynn races against time to uncover a complex plot that stretches from murder in Vienna to a natural gas terminal attack in the Baltic to a major Caribbean oil installation off U.S. shores. Lynn is baffled as she learns of a high-stakes takeover bid by a mysterious group called the Second Law. Who are these people? Worse, who is the mole inside TriCoast that is feeding them so much deadly information? Unless she can find out, thousands more are scheduled to die.

"An explosive debut novel"--Boston Globe Book Forum "Starks has made an impressive debut with the command, passion, and insight of an insider." -Michael Lucker, executive producer, Lucky Dog Filmworks "Wow...Once I was hooked, I was flipping the pages as fast as possible. I loved the whole plot because I found it to be very unique. The characters were very realistic and I loved how the story is told from both the protagonist and villain's point of view." -Tina Chan, reviewer, The Book LandersEnergy executive Lynn Dayton thinks her challenge is fixing the troubled Houston refinery her company has just bought. But soon she must save it, and other refineries, from the havoc and deaths directed by a French saboteur, simultaneously fighting off threats to her own life. As Lynn deals with chemical leaks, disloyal employees, a new season of hurricanes, and mounting casualties, Robert Guillard, a corrupted idealist, tries to manipulate her through her vulnerable sister. Can Lynn save her sister, her thousands of colleagues, and herself?