Vonnegut's debut meets the gold standard for financial thrillers as it puts the frenzied, cutthroat world of Wall Street's best stockbrokers (aka the "top producers") on brilliant display. Ripples from the bizarre murder of Charlie Kelemen, wealthy hedge fund operator, quickly reach his best friend, Grove O'Rourke. A top producer at the boutique investment bank Sachs, Kidder and Carnegie, O'Rourke tries to help Kelemen's widow sort out some financial questions. This process leads him deeper and deeper into a labyrinth of deceit. As fallout from Charlie's death and dealings start to taint O'Rourke, the sharks, inside and outside his own firm, smell blood and begin to circle. O'Rourke won't go down without a fight, and not all the blood in the water will be his. Vonnegut, himself a veteran fund manager, handles the arcane terminology and slang of Wall Street with aplomb, never letting it get in the way of the story. 100,000 first printing. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

The author, a veteran of the world of high finance (and not, in case you're wondering, related to Kurt Vonnegut), turns in a very good first novel. Grove O'Rourke is a top producer for his investment firm, responsible for turning healthy profits for his many clients. When Grove's best friend dies under very suspicious circumstances murder is the only logical conclusion Grove finds that doing a small favor for the man's widow, locating the dead man's vast assets, proves to be inexplicably difficult and dangerous. Soon Grove, who always thought he was fairly well versed in the cutthroat rules of his business, learns that there are unexplored and deadly, dark corners and that love of money really is the rool of evil. A smartly constructed tale with an appealing lead, the novel should appeal to fans of thrillers set in the world of big business (those of Joseph Finder, for example).--Pitt, David Copyright 2009 Booklist

In his debut, Wall Street executive Vonnegut (and yes, a distant relation to Kurt) presents Grove O'Rourke, a 32-year-old hotshot at a New York investment firm, where he manages $2 billion for his wealthy clients. When Grove witnesses the gruesome murder of his best friend and mentor, Charlie Kelemen, and learns that Charlie's wife, Sam, knows nothing about her husband's dealings and is penniless, he sets out to track down the killers and his friend's missing funds. Grove soon finds that Charlie had many secrets, some of them personally devastating. For those who have followed the demise of Madoff's Ponzi scheme, the crux of the plot will seem either old stuff or news ripped from the headlines. And, unless readers are up on zero-cost dollars, downside protection, delta hedging, prepaid forwards, and derivatives, their eyes will likely glaze over at some of the financial maneuvers. VERDICT Though it's hard these days to feel sympathy for investment bankers and stockbrokers, Vonnegut makes his irreverent protagonist someone we can root for as he pursues crooks who use the redemptive language of hedge funds to hide financial malfeasance. A promising debut (the author has a two-book deal). [See Prepub Mystery, LJ 5/1/09.]--Ron Terpening, Univ. of Arizona, Tucson (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.