About this item
It's a violent encounter that private investigator Andy Hayes could have done without. One minute he's finishing up some grocery shopping ahead of a custody visit with his sons. The next, he must come to the rescue of a Somali-American mother and her young children as anti-immigrant bullies torment them. Grateful for his intervention, the Somali community hires Andy to find a missing teenager who vanished without a trace and is now accused of plotting a terror attack in his adopted hometown of Columbus, Ohio. The government is certain that nineteen-year-old Abdi Mohamed followed in the footsteps of his brother, who died in Syria a few months earlier in a jihadi assault. But Mohamed's family isn't convinced, describing a soccer-loving American kid who renounced his brother's actions and planned to attend college in the fall and become a diplomat someday. Soon Andy is fending off fed-up FBI agents and dueling with a mysterious foe with links to the white supremacist movement. As he draws ever closer to the truth behind Mohamed's disappearance, Hayes stumbles onto a conspiracy that could put hundreds of lives in danger, including his own two boys.
About the Author
By day I'm an Associated Press reporter in Columbus covering criminal justice, the Ohio Statehouse and long-lived zoo animals. By earlier in the day, I write the "Andy Hayes" private eye series published by Swallow Press, featuring a former Ohio State and Cleveland Browns quarterback turned investigator. I'm also the editor of "Columbus Noir" from Akashic Books. My short mystery fiction has appeared in multiple publications including "Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine," "Mystery Weekly Magazine," and "Mystery Tribune." My 2009 nonfiction book, "No Winners Here Tonight," is the definitive history of the death penalty in Ohio. When I'm not writing or reporting, I enjoy running, reading, spending time with family and trying to remember why having a dog, three cats and two parakeets seemed like a good idea at the time.
