Night of the Jaguar
A Novel
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
In Joe Gannon's debut novel, Night of the Jaguar, a former Sandinista guerrilla comandante turned cop investigates a series of murders that appear to be political executions.
Sandinista Police Captain Ajax Montoya is six days sober and losing his mind. How else to explain his nights waking in bed, his hand wrapped around that bloody-minded stiletto from the old days, or the presence outside his window, a face with no eyes watching him?
How far the heroic have fallen. Ajax was once the gallant comandante guerrillero. A hero of the Nicaraguan revolutionaries in their long uprising against the Ogre and his hated National Guard. Back then he'd been the guy who got the bloody missions -- as a lowly grunt with that blade, or the commander of an entire front. Back then he knew what was what and who to trust. But as the clarity of war gave way to the hazy reality of peace, Ajax fared less well. And after he took the fall for an assassination he had no part of, he tumbled into a bottle, and maybe out of his mind.
Now he's a homicide investigator in Managua solving murders and sweating through the nightmares from his guerilla days. When he's called to investigate a robbery turned gruesome murder, Ajax recognizes the marks of a surprising enemy - the CIA mercenary army known as The Contra. This isn't just a random murder; this is an execution, a call to war. Or is it? And why does no one want to know but Ajax?
As the bodies pile up and a red-headed gringa who should be his enemy enchants his thoughts, Ajax questions whether he can stay sober, sane, and alive long enough to figure it all out.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The Nicaraguan Sandinista Revolution provides the intriguing backdrop for Gannon's riveting, action-packed debut. Once a hallowed warrior and member of State Security, Capt. Ajax Montoya has been relegated to homicide investigations because of the regime's dissatisfaction with his role in the assassination of Jorge Salazar, a Contra leader. When a prosperous-looking man, apparently the victim of a robbery, turns up dead in a sewage ditch in a poor barrio, Montoya recognizes that the crime scene has been staged and the wound patterns actually bear the signature of a Contra-style execution. Montoya investigates the killing, but since the Sandinistas distrust him, he's paired with a partner, Lt. Gladys Dar o, who's spying on him and reporting back to Montoya's archenemy, Vladimir Malhora, Commander of the Directorate General of State Security. As several other similarly executed corpses turn up, Montoya cannot trust anyone and must singlehandedly find out who is responsible. Readers will eagerly await Gannon's next book.