The Insider by Ava McCarthy

Harper

A tense, riveting thriller?
Shh, I’m reading. Yeah, finished in a minute. G’way. I can’t put down The Insider, Ava McCarthy’s cracking first thriller.
With a lovely love story?
Far from. A story where you clutch the book, eyes bulging, tongue sticking out of the corner of your mouth, not realising you’re holding your breath until you gasp with horror.
Plot twists? Thrills?
More twists and turns than a property developer’s back pocket. More thrills than a day in Limerick. Geeky grrrl Harry Martinez is pursued by a maniac who signs threatening anonymised emails ‘The Prophet’, and kills her friends.
Can’t she, er, hack The Prophet back?
You’d think so - but the emailer knows all about the €12 million her father and his rogue trader pals stashed away in a numbered account.
Of course, €12 million goes nowhere nowadays
Oh yes it does - it appears in Harry’s own bank account, then, just as she’s arranged to pay it back to the bad guy, *pouf*, it disappears again.
Trouble coming every day. But a tough babe has her ways?
Oh yes. Harry would mind mice at crossroads - and hack into their user accounts while she did it. She follows the money all the way to the Caribbean - but I won’t spoil it.
Wait - what about the da? Wouldn’t he know who’s after the €12m?
He’s the last thing Harry wants to see - a gambler who lost the house when she was a kid, and now a thief. Also he’s due for release from Arbour Hill, and she doesn’t want to queer his pitch.
Blood will tell?
You might say. Harry has inherited his creative way with a problem, and he taught her to be a poker ace when she was in nappies.
The writer knows her stuff?
Yup; an analyst programmer for the London Stock Exchange’s trading division; she got a first in physics and a masters in nuclear medicine - and she can write.
Is it a buy?
Mos’ def. Right to the end - where there’s a fabulous final twist - she keeps you hanging on.