The Big Score
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
A billionaire's commission draws an architect into a conspiracy of sex, lies, and murder
The ship is dead in the water. Its lines are tangled and its sails are slack as it drifts toward the rocky coast. A fisherman spies the vessel and steps aboard, expecting it to be deserted. But there is 1 passenger: a lovely young woman with a rolled-up painting in her hand and 2 bullets in her chest.
Across Lake Michigan, Matthias Curland returns to Chicago for the 1st time since he gave up architecture to devote himself to fine art. After emptying his bank accounts for the pursuit of painting, he's shocked to find that his once-affluent family is also destitute, and their famed architecture firm is on the verge of bankruptcy. When the Curland name is linked to the dead woman's painting, Matthias finds himself facing off against a power-mad billionaire who could bring Chicago to its knees.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In his seventh novel, Kilian ( The Last Virginia Gentleman ) tells a fast-paced story of murder and corruption among Chicago's upper crust. Matthias Curland returns from his dissolute life as a second-rate painter on the Cote d'Azur for his mother's funeral, only to find his once-wealthy German-American family bankrupt and his father's architecture firm about to close its doors. When a painting from a Curland-funded museum is discovered on the family sailboat--wrapped around the corpse of a woman who had been involved with both Matthias and his embittered, alcoholic brother, Christian--Zane Rawlings, police chief of the small town of Grand Pier, Mich., starts an investigation that quickly turns dangerous. Matthias, meanwhile, is hired to design a skyscraper by Trump-like billionaire Peter Poe and quickly falls in love with Poe's wife Diandra, a brainy, coolly elegant former model. Further developments lead back to the dead woman and the stolen painting. Kilian has a great feel for plot; his complicated story moves gracefully to a swift, satisfying conclusion. While some of the characterizations are a little broad, on the whole this is a thoroughly entertaining thriller.
