Rip Crew

by Sebastian Rotella

Overview

In this "taut, tense international thriller" (Alafair Burke), streetwise U.S. agent Valentine Pescatore investigates a brutal killing that reveals a vast conspiracy of wealth and power. One of Kirkus Reviews's Best Mysteries of the Year!

Valentine Pescatore, the globetrotting former Border Patrol agent, finds himself back on American soil investigating the merciless killing of a group of women in a motel room. At first, the crime seems to be a straightforward case of gangsters battling for territory. Soon, however, the motive is revealed to be much deeper and more sinister: a single witness who knows too much is being hunted, at any cost.

From an author who has been praised for his "pounding action scenes [and] ferocious prose style" (Marilyn Stasio, NYTBR), Rip Crew races at breakneck speed as Pescatore finds himself face-to-face with his most terrifying assignment yet.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316505536
Publisher:	Little, Brown and Company
Publication date:	03/13/2018
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.40(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

Sebastian Rotella is the author of The Convert's Song and Triple Crossing, which the New York Times Book Review named its favorite debut crime novel of 2011, as well as the nonfiction book Twilight on the Line. He is a senior reporter covering international security issues for ProPublica, a newsroom dedicated to investigative journalism in the public interest.

He worked for twenty-three years for the Los Angeles Times, serving as bureau chief in Paris and Buenos Aires. His honors include a Peabody Award; Columbia University's Dart Award and Moors Cabot Prize for Latin American coverage; the German Marshall Fund's Weitz Prize for reporting in Europe; five Overseas Press Club Awards; The Urbino Prize of Italy, and an Emmy nomination. He was a Pulitzer finalist for international reporting in 2006.

Editorial Reviews

01/08/2018
Leo Méndez, the former chief of the Diogenes Group police unit in Tijuana, Mexico, is now a journalist living in San Diego, Calif., in Rotella’s strong third series thriller (after 2014’s The Convert’s Song). When Méndez’s old boss in Mexico asks for his help exposing the Blake Acquisitions Group, a U.S. firm that’s apparently in cahoots with Mexican narcopoliticians, he agrees to do so. Meanwhile, Méndez’s old PI friend, Valentine Pescatore, wants Méndez’s help investigating the murders of 10 women shot execution-style in a Tecate motel. The horrific crime is assumed to have been perpetrated by an unknown “rip crew,” a gang that specializes in ripping off drug smugglers. Méndez and Pescatore’s investigations merge, and both men fight off several assassination attempts. Rotella writes convincingly about the realities and mechanics of investigative journalism, and his detailed action scenes add just enough mayhem to keep thriller readers on the edge of their seats. Agent: Bonnie Nadell, Hill Nadell Literary Agency. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

"Rip Crew is a taut, tense international thriller, filled with complex characters and gritty dialogue. Utterly riveting."—Alafair Burke, New York Times bestselling author of The Wife

"This latest installment in a series including Triple Crossing and The Convert's Song is about as tightly woven and rock-solid as international thrillers get. Rotella is as good at setting up action scenes as he is at springing them (which is saying something: the shootouts are terrific). The crisp dialogue feeds the sculpted plot and vice versa. There is nary a wasted moment in the book or one in which Rotella isn't in complete command. . . . Rotella's latest is a tense, gritty thriller-perfectly seedy when it needs to be and near-perfect in its overall execution."—Kirkus Reviews (starred)

"Gritty dialog rings convincingly with authenticity as Rotella playfully inspects multiple layers of meaning inherent in dialects, news stories, and eyewitness accounts. For fans of tough crime fiction in the tradition of T. Jefferson Parker."—Library Journal (starred)

"What a setup! It's heartrending, violent, and intriguing...readers will hang on for the revelation and the mighty clash at the end."—Don Crinklaw, Booklist

"Rotella writes convincingly about the realities and mechanics of investigative journalism, and his detailed action scenes add just enough mayhem to keep thriller readers on the edge of their seats."—Publishers Weekly

"Gritty dialog rings convincingly with authenticity as Rotella playfully inspects multiple layers of meaning inherent in dialects, news stories, and eyewitness accounts. For fans of tough crime fiction in the tradition of T. Jefferson Parker."—Library Journal

From the Publisher

★ 2017-12-24
Valentine Pescatore, a private investigator working under contract to Homeland Security, teams with sometime cop, sometime crusading journalist Leo Méndez to penetrate the conspiracy surrounding the killing of 10 African women in a Mexican motel.The Chicago-born Pescatore, who became a PI in Argentina after messing up as a U.S. Border Patrol agent, has recently relocated from Buenos Aires to Washington, D.C., to work again for Isabel Puente, his former boss and one-time lover. Under government protection, Méndez has moved to San Diego with his wife and children to escape the Mexican Mafia and its "rip crews"—roving robbers and killers. At the heart of the motel murders is an illicit scheme involving an American financial outfit with ties to Mexico that is being investigated for money laundering. After an Eritrean cleaning woman is sexually assaulted by one of the company's partners and escapes to Mexico with an incriminating flash drive from her attacker's computer, her life is in danger. Ultimately, wherever they go to connect the dots of the case—Mexico, southern California, Guatemala, Italy—Pescatore and Méndez are under threat as well. (Different troubles await Pescatore in Paris, where a breakup with his counterterrorism-agent girlfriend, Fatima, seems likely.) This latest installment in a series including Triple Crossing (2011) and The Convert's Song (2014) is about as tightly woven and rock-solid as international thrillers get. Rotella is as good at setting up action scenes as he is at springing them (which is saying something: the shootouts are terrific). The crisp dialogue feeds the sculpted plot and vice versa. There is nary a wasted moment in the book or one in which Rotella isn't in complete command. The entertaining combo of Pescatore and Méndez is icing on the cake.Rotella's latest is a tense, gritty thriller—perfectly seedy when it needs to be and near-perfect in its overall execution.

Kirkus Review