Shelter from the Storm - Softcover

Mewshaw, Michael

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0425193756 ISBN 13: 9780425193754

Publisher: Blue Hen Trade, 2004

Synopsis

When a group of Islamic fundamentalists kidnaps his son-in-law, demanding in exchange a feral local child, aging security consultant Zack McClintock journeys to central Asia, where he encounters tribal and sectarian violence, deceit, and betrayal. Reprint. 20,000 first printing.

About this title

About the Author:

Michael Mewshaw is the author of eight critically acclaimed novels, including Year of the Gun, and six other books of nonfiction, including the recent memoir Do I Owe You Something?: A Memoir of the Literary Life. He has won awards for his investigative journalism, tennis reporting, and travel writing. He has written for The New York Times, the Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, The Nation, The New Statesman, and Granta. Mewshaw and his wife divide their time between Key West and Europe.

From Publishers Weekly:

Mewshaw's ninth novel is a timely, stylish international thriller set in an anarchic fictional republic in Central Asia. Zack McClintock's wife died during his second tour in Vietnam, leaving him to raise their infant daughter, Adrienne, alone. He has been dogged by guilt and bad karma ever since. Now in her late 20s, Adrienne is married to a much older plant pathologist, Paul Fletcher, who gets a temporary posting at a non-governmental organization in Central Asia. Fletcher is kidnapped by Islamic fundamentalists, and the State Department refuses to give the $1-million ransom for his return. Then a second ransom note mysteriously changes the terms of the bargain: Fletcher will be returned unharmed if a feral "wolf boy," currently in the custody of an American woman in Central Asia, can be flown to the U.S. for treatment. Zack, now retired from the Marines and working as a security consultant, gives in to his daughter's plea and heads to the lawless region-teeming with Islamists, mafia and former Red Army soldiers-to negotiate with the captors himself. He's thwarted at every turn by locals who plead ignorance out of fear for their lives; he's mugged by a woman who was a lover of his son-in-law's; and he's forced to kill a mafia man who tries to steal his money belt. Zack also falls in love with Kathryn Matthews, who is sheltering the feral boy. Mewshaw plumbs both the tragic and comically absurd elements of post-Soviet Central Asian life as Zack mixes uneasily with the colorfully amoral natives. The narrative culminates in an absorbing, romantic climax as Zack, Kathryn and the wolf boy make a desperate run for freedom.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Blue Hen Trade
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0425193756
• ISBN 13: 9780425193754
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288