Safe House A Burke Novel

The new novel from Andrew Vachss puts Burke 'hard-core career criminal and man-for-hire' up against a new breed of predator: stalkers. Some obsessed, some deranged, all dangerous. Burke's old prison pal Hercules, hired by a shadowy network that runs a safehouse for stalking victims, botched the job, and one of the stalkers is dead. To save his partner, Burke has to penetrate the network, and he makes a deal with the boss, Crystal Beth, a woman as obsessed as the stalkers. But Crystal Beth has a stalker of her own, an extortionist who threatens to bring down her entire network unless she surrenders one of the women she's hiding. When Burke learns that the extortionist might be government-issue, and that the stalker he's protecting is a member of a neo-Nazi cell with plans to make Oklahoma City look like a pipe bomb, his survivalist instincts go on full alert ("When there's too many loose threads, somebody always weaves them into a noose"). And when it comes down to making his own house and his family-of-choice safe, Burke turns lethal. With blistering power, Safe House reminds us why Kirkus has called Burke "one of the most fascinating male characters in crime fiction." From the Hardcover edition.

Andrew Vachss, an attorney in private practice specializing in juvenile justice and child abuse, is the country’s best recognized and most widely sought after spokesperson on crimes against children. He is also a bestselling novelist and short story writer, whose works include <b>Flood</b> (1985), the novel which first introduced Vachss’ series character Burke, <b>Strega</b> (1987), <b>Choice of Evil</b> (1999), and <b>Dead and Gone</b> (2000). His short stories have appeared in <i>Esquire</i>, <i>Playboy</i>, and <i>The Observer</i>, and he is a contributor to <i>ABA Journal</i>, <i>Journal of Psychohistory</i>, <i>New England Law Review</i>, <i>The New York Times</i>, and <i>Parade</i>.<br><br>Vachss has worked as a federal investigator