The Prince of Risk by Christopher Reich

Published by Doubleday on December 3, 2013

A conspiracy is afoot and the only (good) people who know about it are the Secretary of the Treasury, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, and the CEO of the New York Stock Exchange. Until they die. Just before their car explodes on the White House lawn, the head of the NYSE texts the word Palantir to his estranged son, hedge fund master Bobby Astor, whose ex-wife, Alex Forza, happens to be an FBI agent. Astor has no idea what Palantir means, but he is determined to find out. The conspirators, of course, are aware of the text, knowledge that puts Astor's life in peril. In the meantime, Astor has made a bet that Chinese currency will be devalued, a gamble that places him in financial peril, to the extent of losing 400 million dollars.

Global conspiracies are plentiful and far-reaching in the word of thrillers. This one involves electronic surveillance of 57,000 influential people (mostly in government and business). Impressive but credible, given the resources of the conspiracy's backers. Is the conspiracy farfetched? In some respects, yes, but no more farfetched than is common in modern thrillers. Apart from one scene at the end, nothing about the story made me unwilling to suspend my disbelief, in part because Reich includes convincing detail about the conspiracy's design. Of course, a reader who is more knowledgeable about software or the mechanics of Wall Street financial transactions might not be as easily convinced as I was. And even to the extent that I was unconvinced, the story is so fun that I easily overcame my skepticism.

The story features -- wait for it -- a warrior monk. I have to admit that I wasn't expecting a warrior monk to show up on Wall Street, but Reich somehow makes it work. In fact, Reich makes a lot of things work together in this entertaining joinder of a financial thriller with an international conspiracy thriller. He builds tension as several storylines weave together and he advances the plot at a steady pace. His characters are flawed in ways that make them interesting but they never become thoroughly unlikable. Alex's characterization as a self-righteous a-hole is realistic, even if the prayers she says while standing before a portrait of J. Edgar Hoover are a little over-the-top. At the same time, these are the conventional characters of genre fiction, developed without richness or texture. That's one of the novel's only weakness, and it's a small one given that this is a plot-driven story. The other, again small, is that the plot features few surprises (other than the appearance of a warrior monk), but I enjoyed it all the same.

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