Review: "Greed, Corruption, and Dishonesty Lose Out"
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 04 11, 2014
This is the third and last story of "The King Trilogy."  I've read the first two, which are excellent, but this one is the BEST!  I loved it!  In this last episode, Kerri King has become legendary on Wall Street.  She is now the president and CEO of Iacardi and Sons, commodities brokers, with offices in the South Tower of the World Trade Center.  She should be at work today, Tuesday, but she's down with a with a severe case of influenza.  It's September 11, 2001.  Her life is spared, but her company is being ripped and torn apart as the building is struck by a huge hijacked Boeing 767, Flight 175.  In London, Peter Tavaris, a senior trader for Iacardi postpones the conference so he can follow the news of the NYC disaster.  He has frequently been passed over by Charles Iacardi for senior management positions and also as president in favor of Kerri King.  He hates women, especially Kerri and has a vindictive core.  Kerri's dad, Mike King, and his wife Karen arrive home to Muskoka, Canada.  At 59 years old, he's been successful with his XG Petroleum company by its growth into a national chain.  He and Karen now have time to enjoy slowing down a bit since Golden National Oil has 50 percent interest in XG.  They are aboard their 21-foot Donzi boat headed for Azimuth Island which his wife has inherited from her late parents.  The large three-lake area is the retreat area for the rich and famous to enjoy their multi-million dollar cottages.  Kerri is devastated about the destruction of the South Tower in which of her 346 employees, only four have survived.  She needs to talk to her dad about the 186 million dollars left from a settlement with the government over oil sales back in 1991.  Miles Dennis, her mentor at Iacardi who has died in the attack, had moved that money to Switzerland as Mike didn't want anything to do with it.  But now Miles is dead and the only people who know about that money is Mike, Karen, and Kerri who's the sole owner of that account.  Kerri wants to use that money to help the families of the Iacardi employees who had died on 9-11.  But no one knows if that money is hot or cold, and there would be questions when that money came back into the United States.  She wishes to give it all away, equally to each family, as an anonymous donor.  Sounds like a plan? Yes, but someone is going to try to get Kerri tagged perhaps for tax evasion on those funds over the last ten years.  Would it be Tavaris who is contacted by an old classmate who wants to buy Iacardi, only in a stock exchange, no cash.  Kerri holds only three percent of the stock, but Tavaris is adamant to seal this proposed deal, even if it means burying her in dirty laundry, or a grave.  This is an easy to read story I could not put down.  It's compelling, extraordinary, finely honed, and sometimes even heartbreaking.  But I read it to the very end, and the last two words made me laugh out loud!  There is nothing boring about this exemplary novel written by very talented Stephen Douglass.  I hope he is working on another book to thrill me.  Give it a shot, it will inspire you!