#Review - Safecracker by Ryan Wick #Thriller #Suspense

Series: Unknown
Format: Hardcover, 320 pages
Release Date: December 25th 2020
Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books
Source: Publisher
Genre: Thriller / Suspense

In this wicked debut, safecracker Michael Maven must pull off the most dangerous theft of his long career--or his friends and family will be killed.

Safecracker Michael Maven's latest job should be simple: steal a rare coin from a New York apartment. Then the coin's owner comes home with a beautiful woman. So he hides. Then she murders him. So he hides a bit better. Then she tries to take the coin herself, which is the last straw. While Maven narrowly escapes being killed himself, he's then coerced by her boss, a sadistic drug lord, into a far more complicated, far more dangerous job.

If Maven fails to crack the safe of a rival cartel boss in Miami, his friends and family will die. If he succeeds, they still might. Which means he not only has to somehow pull off an impossible heist, but also outwit two crime bosses as well as the woman, his reluctant new partner.

Safecracker is fast-paced, has tons of action, and it's cinematic in the most appealing way.

"You put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle; you put it in a teapot, it becomes a teapot. Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend"

Safecracker is author Ryan Wick's debut novel. 32-year old Michael Maven leads a double life. In his day job, he owns the Sundown Cinemas which barely survives on what it brings in. However, it is a fantastic business in which one could launder money through from his other job. Michael's employer, Elizabeth Rose, offers him a time sensitive job. All he needs to do is get in and get out with a 1343 Edward III Florin coin which is said to be worth millions. The coin was recently purchased by Raymond Hemsworth, a wealthy American hedge fund manager. It just so happens to be the 5th rarest coin in the world.  

Michael isn't just any thief, he's a master thief who has proudly honed his craft after years under his father's tutelage before making a name for himself. Michael learns the hard way that if a job seems too easy to be true, it probably is. The mission goes to hell quickly when Hemsworth unexpectedly returns home with a stunningly beautiful woman in tow. Michael hides, but to his horror, he watches the woman kill the hedge fund manager, proceeding to steal the coin from the safe. This is too much for him, but he underestimates her phenomenal fighting abilities as she gets away with the coin. which puts him squarely in the eye of the authorities.

Maven goes into overdrive to find out who the woman is, deploying the expertise, resources and knowledge of his friend Jimmy of Alistair's Pub, his employer Elizabeth Rose, while also hiring former NYPD cop, Jerry 'Doc' MacIntosh, now running a lucrative private investigation business. It turns out the woman Maven encountered is Katarina George. She's a deadly Ukrainian assassin for the Sinaloa cartel, Luis 'El Cerdo (The Pig)' Alvarez, a Chicago crime boss. With his family and friends under threat, Maven is forced by Alvarez to carry out the heist of a lifetime at the home of a rival cartel's boss in Miami, Florida.  

Maven finds himself caught between the terrors of the infighting between the cartels, with the FBI, in the form of Special Agent Rebecca Browning who wants his help in putting Alvarez behind bars. I was going to scream about the ending until I logged into Goodreads and saw that this was the authors debut and the first installment in his new series. So, that's good. There definitely needs to be more after that cliffhanger ending. How can you not love a book that begins with the protagonist's throat being cut in the first sentence?!  

*Note* While I was writing my review for this book (07/19/2020), it appeared that the book has been pushed back by the publisher until December 25th 2020. Also, there's no buy links available at this writing. It's as though the publisher has cancelled the book.

Amazon | Audible | Barnes & Noble |  Kobo