THE DEEPEST CUT

The 11th outing for the Monkeewrench gang and its associates is, as Tracy says, “more a continuation than a sequel” to their 10th, Ice Cold Heart (2019).

Det. Leo Magozzi’s last day on the job with Minneapolis PD Homicide kicks off with news of two prison escapes 4,000 miles apart. A timely explosion helps Goran Stanković, who insists that he’s not a war criminal, escape his confinement in The Hague, and a hack of the security system frees Wolfgang Mauer, who’d hastened Magozzi’s retirement by shooting him, from the Gustavus Adolphus Security Hospital. Mauer kills a passerby for his clothing, identification, and vehicle; Stanković, seeking $20 million in bitcoin he thinks Mauer stole from him, makes a beeline for Minnesota. Since Mauer’s known to have a hit list of the Eight that presumably includes all the co-founders of Monkeewrench Software—cowboy Harley Davidson; programmer Annie Belinsky; funky Roadrunner; and Grace MacBride, Magozzi’s baby mama and longtime domestic partner—they swiftly act to turn themselves into moving targets whose best defense is an unstoppable offense. Suspense is limited by the fact that the good guys, from Monkeewrench to the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, are so numerous, well-informed, and well-equipped, and the bad guys so unremittingly hostile to each other. But Mauer’s kidnapping of Travis Dunbar, an abused 10-year-old he somehow bonds with, supplies a wild card that complicates his every encounter, and fans of the crew will welcome their return and root for Magozzi to survive his last day and make the right decision when it’s over.

Welcome back, Monkeewrench. Long may you wave.