The latest stand-alone from the chronicler of Eve Duncan and her remarkable family tells the story of an equally remarkable bunch of freelance law enforcers arrayed against a nefarious mercenary. Jorge Masenak has outdone himself with his latest coup: Stealing a dozen racehorses lodged at Morocco's St. Eldon's Academy, kidnapping 59 students from the girls school, passing them around to his confederates, and threatening to execute them if any government agency makes a move against him. Cue the entrance of rogue CIA agent Alisa Flynn, who promptly persuades tech mogul Gabe Korgan to help her rescue the girls. Alisa is particularly close to Sasha Nalano, her official ward, who's a wizard with horses, and Sasha is especially close to Chaos, an ill-tempered stallion with preternatural speed--so close that girl and horse communicate telepathically. Enlisting soldier of fortune John Gilroy to help with logistics, Alisa and Korgan quickly devise a plan to rescue the hostages. But Masenak escapes, taking Sasha and Chaos, whom he's determined to have Sasha train on a dramatically accelerated schedule so he can be raced one-on-one against Nightshade, the Triple Crown winner owned by ruthless lumber baron Marcus Reardon. Instead of sweating the details of plotting or characterization, Johansen sets this modern swashbuckler in an alternative reality in which the heroes can infiltrate the villain's armored strongholds at will, characters compare each other to Wonder Woman and Indiana Jones, and the software has powers as superhuman as the people who develop and use it in the field. Everything and everybody is larger than life yet somehow smaller than life as well. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Johansen is back with a new heroine, CIA agent Alisa Flynn. Like her predecessors in Johansen's canon, she is tough, determined, capable, and focused. In her debut appearance, Alisa is partnered with inventor, entrepreneur, and soldier-of-fortune Gabe Korigan to rescue dozens of girls from a Boko Harum-type kidnapping conducted by Masenek, a sadistic African warlord. The girls were students at an elite private academy also attended by Alisa's ward, 15-year-old Sasha Lawrence. Saving the girls from relentless rape and torture is mission one, complicated by Sasha's talents as an extraordinary horsewoman. Masenek has entered into a high-stakes race against his nemesis, Reardon, and it is up to Sasha to deliver a winning performance on a cantankerous horse. Flynn, Korigan, and their cadre of special operatives also race against time and the unknown to defeat Masenek and Reardon and save Sasha and her prized horses. Though Flynn is a new star in Johansen's pantheon, her personification of familiar tropes of female strength, power, sexual attraction, and supernatural talents will make her an instant hit with Johansen 's many loyal fans.

This exciting series launch from bestseller Johansen (the Eve Duncan series) introduces Alisa Flynn, a special operative of the CIA, who was recruited at 13 when she was a street orphan in Caracas, Venezuela. Three truckloads of a military guerrilla group descend on St. Eldon's Academy, a girls' school in Morocco. Besides intending to hold the richest girls for ransom and selling the rest, they want to take possession of the school's stable of thoroughbred horses, the paperwork regarding their pedigrees, and teenager Sasha Lawrence. Sasha is known as "something of a horse whisperer," who "can coax a horse to do almost anything for her." Unfortunately for mercenary Jorge Masenak, the leader of the intruders, she's also Alisa's ward. Alisa puts her career and life on the line to track down Masenak and save Sasha, with the aid of Gabe Korgan, a Nobel Prize winner, inventor, and billionaire, and Margaret Douglas, a fellow animal whisperer who's appeared in another Johansen series. The wildly over-the-top characters and plot race toward a fittingly extravagant conclusion. Johansen's fans will be in heaven. Agent: Andrea Cirillo, Jane Rotrosen Agency. (Sept.)