*Finder,
Joseph. Paranoia. St. Martin’s. Winter 2004. c432p. ISBN
0-312-31914-2. $24.95. Fiction.
Adam Cassidy is a slacker who has screwed
up big time. He’s only a junior product-line manager
at Wyatt Telecom, but he has embezzled what turns out to be
a shocking $78,000. The money went to cover a retirement bash
for a loading-dock foreman, to give him the same splurge executives
get. Adam hates his job, so he would not have minded being
fired. Instead, he’s threatened by Corporate Security
with up to 20 years in a Federal penitentiary unless he agrees
to infiltrate their rival company—Trion Systems. With
Wyatt backing him at every step, he’s hired by Trion
and soon finds himself an executive assistant to the CEO, a
man who treats him like a son. Adam, whose own bitter father
is dying of emphysema, is torn by ethical dilemmas as he takes
ever greater risks to penetrate the layers of security around
Trion’s latest project, the most important technological
breakthrough since the integrated circuit. Don’t start
this book at 8:00 p.m. or you’ll be up all night. Finder’s
(Zero Hour) latest is a fun read with a hip narrator, an engaging
story set in a world rarely seen in thrillers, and great suspense.
Highly recommended for all popular fiction collections.