Risk

August 3, 2009
In Harrison's entertaining urban noir, which has been revised since the New York Times Magazine
ran it as a serial, Manhattan insurance attorney George Young agrees to help Mrs. Corbett, the widow of his firm's founder, with a minor mystery. How did Corbett's son, Roger, spend his final hours before a garbage truck struck him dead? The images a security camera captured of Roger's last moments mesmerize the amateur detective. Young's investigation leads him to Eliska Sedlacek, a Czech hand model, who was Roger's mistress for the last few months of his life. Eliska is eager to get access to Roger's possessions, which his ex-wife has placed in long-term storage. Some mundane items belonging to Roger, including an old phone book bought on eBay and some Christmas ornaments, turn out to be of interest to some unsavory figures. Harrison (The Finder
) telegraphs the final reveal early on, but the colorful narrative voice will leave many readers wishing for more.

September 1, 2009
Harrison's fleet seventh novel, originally serialized in the New York Times Magazine, follows an insurance attorney down a trail he wishes he'd never taken.

Ten weeks after her son Roger is killed, Diana Corbett, herself seriously ill, tells George Young that she needs to know more about his last hours. It isn't his death she wants George to investigate—surveillance video shows that Roger emerged from a bar at 1:30 a.m. and got hit by a garbage truck as he paused after stepping off the curb to examine a piece of paper from his pocket—but the question of what he was doing for the four hours he sat in the bar. George, who's by no means a professional detective, can't imagine why imperious Diana has chosen him for this job. But he's done a fair amount of work investigating fraudulent claims, and he's always been grateful to Diana's late husband, his firm's founder, for plucking him from obscurity. So he begins to ask questions and in short order finds some answers, though none to Diana's liking. She refuses to acknowledge that Eliska Sedlacek, the willowy Czech hand model with whom Roger spent most of his last evening and many nights before, was his girlfriend. Instead she's more interested in the call Roger made from his cell phone minutes before he died, a call that remains as much a mystery to George as the question of what was written on the vanished piece of paper that so interested Roger. Meanwhile, Eliska has developed a strong interest in a box of Christmas tree ornaments Roger's ex-wife cleaned out of his apartment after his death. George spends a great deal of time tracking down the ornaments and figuring out why Eliska cares so much about them before he confronts Roger's darkest secret.

If this fast-paced, surprisingly reflective yarn doesn't measure up to Harrison's more ambitious thrillers (The Finder, 2007, etc.), it's well worth its price and length.

(COPYRIGHT (2009) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

August 15, 2009
George Young is your standard modern New Yorker; he's a pretty good insurance lawyer with a pretty good marriage who enjoys a glass or two of pretty good wine in the evening. When he's contacted by the elderly widow of his mentor about her son's recent death, George doesn't feel he can gracefully excuse himself. The son's career had been on a downward spiral, and, as he was emerging from a bar, he stepped off the curb and was done in by a garbage truck. Playing detective, George obsessively reviews the surveillance tape and uncovers a Czech hand model, a stash of toy soldiers, and something that passes for a long-buried truth. The story, even with its internal psychological emphasis, clips along, with searing cameos of Manhattanites; it should appeal to readers of Patrick McGrath. VERDICT Harrison's latest (following "The Finder") looks at postfinancial meltdown, post-Bernie Madoff Manhattan and not surprisingly delivers a reflective, elegiac tale. Serialization in the "New York Times Magazine" insures there are enough cliff-hangers to hold the attention of fans as well as new readers.Bob Lunn, Kansas City, MO

Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 1, 2009
In this latest thriller, Harrison (The Havana Room, 2004) puts the pedal to the metal and doesnt let up. The opening pages find middle-aged Manhattan insurance lawyer George Young summoned by the widow of his firms formidable founder, Wendell Corbett. Mrs. Corbett wants to know the reason behind her son Rogers death before she goes under the knife for a surgery shes unlikely to survive. But Rogers demise seems to have just been an accident (he was hit by a careening garbage truck as he exited a local bar). Or was it? Young, who owes his career to Wendell Corbett, pledges to find answers. A series of clues leads him to a lithe and comely Czech hand model who may know more than she lets on. Russian mobsters, wily poker-playing informants, and a hot-and-cold New York Yankees ball club are all pivotal players here. Also compelling is Youngs shrewd wife, Carol, who worries about her husband in the way only a longtime partner can. Harrison delivers a crime novel as gritty and electric as New York City itself.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)