FINDING GIDEON

In the fifth installment of the Gideon series, the eponymous assassin plots a second revenge against his childhood enemy—if Midnight doesn’t get his revenge first.

Bitter, scarred, and missing an eye, the mercenary known in Spanish as Medianoche is still very much alive and staying in a hotel in Buenos Aires, where he dreams of killing Gideon many years after the boy shot him in the face. Flashbacks to Medianoche’s first encounters with Gideon’s mother, a beguiling French prostitute, in Montego Bay explain a few details that Gideon missed about his connection to the man who used to frequent his mother’s bedroom while he was trying to sleep. Although there are a few unsavory scenes of underage prostitution and childhood trauma (the least disturbing of which is an improper use of Nyquil), the women and children harmed in this story fight back twice as hard, making it fun to root for the “fathead cereal-eating Nyquil drinking sonofawhore” who maims the crass old man and grows up to finish the job. More sex, violence, and coarse language ensue as Gideon and his crew take on Medianoche and the rest of the Four Horsemen—plus horsewoman Señorita Raven—to try to settle the score. Recaps from Gideon’s past ensure that readers who are new to the series will be able to follow the plot, but fans will be able to spot more details from previous books.

The awkward circumstances that brought the protagonists together make them compelling rivals in this tale of obsession and betrayal.