Kidnapping, murder, and international oil cartels all set the stage for the engrossing fiction The Faircloth Reaction by Richard Whitten Barnes. Just how far will the world’s energy leaders go to protect their considerable interests?
Delano Justice thought he had it made. He’d escaped the tough neighborhoods of Flint, Mich., on a basketball scholarship, worked his way through college and six years as an officer in the Army Special Forces, and was just finishing his doctorate in chemical engineering at North Carolina State University. But he wasn’t prepared for Hinson Faircloth—a young MIT grad student with tortured motives.
When Del reluctantly agrees to help Faircloth with commercializing a new process for synthesizing petroleum, his attitude quickly changes after discovering that the process is unbelievably efficient, producing synthetic oil at unheard of purity and economy. Having no experience in dealing with the high-powered world of international energy deals, the two seek the help of an expert. But when Faircloth gets skittish, he decides to go it alone. The decision proves fatal.
After dealing with Faircloth, a faction of the Russian mafia attempts to silence anyone who might know Faircloth’s formula in an effort to stifle anything that might disrupt their source of oil income. This puts Del and those close to him, including his pregnant fiancée Grace, in very real danger. When Grace is kidnapped, Del recruits some friends and family who begin tying together bits and scraps of clues from various sources, only to find that their search takes them in a direction none of them could have imagined.
The quaint little town of Pinecrest in the mountains of Arizona faces its most harrowing challenge yet—a chilling murder that sends shockwaves through the community.
Marcus Lee, Pinecrest's newly appointed police chief, finds himself at the cente
